Outside, at two in the morning
I say "motherfucker" for the Columbians
to teach them how to cuss the way only
an American can. "Drop the 'R'," I tell
these men who roll 'Rs' as pretty as some
of my friends roll joints. We are five different kinds
of drunk, high off the promise of summer
and a white, pregnant moon. I think of Paulette,
years ago at the Christmas Party, newly
pregnant with a boy named Gabriel,
pissed off at everything she could not
have: the bottle of vodka the Russian broke out,
the stinky mushrooms sneakily circulating.
This is the story Gabriel will never know;
the first night he stood in the doorway
of his mother's true nature. How she departed
abruptly to grapple with his arrival. How many
women never speak of this.
A DJ leans in my passenger's side window
to spin a yarn about Babymama Number One,
how she'd show up at his gigs swoll up with
the best track he'll ever lay or play, and perch
up on top the speakers. This was supposed
to tip me bout how wild she was. Forgive my
vulgarity: when a woman pushes a person
out her pussy, it transforms her. This is what
I'm telling you. It's not always good. When I
was just a girl, my mother made this clear
while feeding every child in the neighborhood,
dragging every unwanted kid off the street.
There are so many children, but mothers
are scarce. Or scarcely sane, plowing their
seed with every insecurity they dream up. There
are multiple narratives to every story. Why not
those of mothers?
I marvel. These women who defrag to DNA
expand like magic, quell wails with their breasts.
I don't begrudge that. Nor the exquisiteness
of a six month old cheek, the charisma of a toothless
grin. Fact is, being a kid is more appealing
than having one. Only a woman no one calls
mama should stand outside at two in the morning
teaching how to say "motherfucker."
These are vulgarities one should not
reproduce. Some folks don't get that, and have
kids anyway. It's one of the reasons my mother
fed them. There are times those children
and I lock eyes. Being a child like them,
I cannot tell you what they tell me.
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