This one is in Rosa's voice--
very first poem in the book--
and it's about feeling misunderstood.
Have you ever felt misunderstood?
Yeah.
"Some people call me a child witch,
but I'm just a girl who likes to watch the hands of the women
as they gather wild herbs and flowers to heal the sick.
I am learning the names of the cures, and how much to use,
and which part of the plant--
petal or stem, root, leaf, pollen, nectar.
Sometimes I feel like a bee making honey--
a bee feared by all, even though the wild bees
of these mountains in Cuba are stingless, harmless,
the source of nothing but sweet golden food."