Prepositions can be sexy, so there you are.
I am a lover of words and going with this notion of language.
Speaking Spanish in Puerto Rico is
very different than speaking Spanish in LA, by the way.
I think Luis is like, yes, that's true.
Certain things get lost in translation.
One of my favorite stories is when I first
met my mother-in-law, and I said the word "pinche".
And that did not go well at the dinner table
because I was asking for a barrette.
I was like, where's my pinche?
And everyone at the dinner table was like, what are you saying?
So this is kind of going along with that.
It's called "Sonnet for our Lexicon."
"The first morning we spoke the language
of our ancestors, confusion spread between us
like an epidemic.
Your furrowed brow stripped my language naked
as I asked you to leave the room but you stood your ground,
I repeated in my boricua Spanish to come back later,
for your Chicano ears understood right now.
You questioned the validity of the word safacón,
laughed when I pointed to the barrette in my hair and called
it a pinche.
I insisted an orange is a china, not a naranja,
how guagua sounded much better than autobús.
As we compile the lists of our lexicons,
Mi Viejo San Juan began to play in the background.
Your hand asked for a dance and my body said Simón."