Así es mi lenguajeo

 Sometimes all we have left

Lo único que queda

-de nuestras raíces –

Is our lenguajeo

In it I discover a map,

a masa of human-made creativity and the remnants of political domination:

the 3D rendition of nations not united that become (one) inseparable

when I stitch them into my personal story.

The “you are here” but maybe also “not from por aquí” and definitely “you (also) come from there” …as if the perceivers become cartographers who decidedly assume my body can be partitioned from the mathematics of the Cordillera Central and El Rio Ozama, or as if the bodies of water that surround my second home can really be categorized into gulf and ocean.

 A veces, all that is left is the rrr rrrroling off my tongue; the open quija’ that blesses in some type of situationship my vowels into dipthongs / that shuffles ma-me-mi-mo-mu into “palabritas de domingo”

At times I wonder whether I remember how to say the thing, or if when I say it, I perform the version of myself that wins me belonging as camouflage. Y otras veces I am reminded that what was “chulo” o “jevi” 30+ years ago, when my body repositioned the boundaries foreign territory and home, is no longer “lit” - that I, too, become obsolete.

In our (no, in my) languaging florecen jardines de secretos , lullabies, cuentos y consejos - el mito de la ciguapa y lo’ cocuyo en el verano eterno (a reminder that with me -perpetually- are the spirits of all my ancestors)

El mapa without borders

In my “modern” lenguajeo I gave up asking “que lo que” with my nose and pointing (that/ eso ahí) using just.my.lips.

I often wonder what has come to replace the percussion that my face offered to the rest of my expression…

 then I remember the last time I danced merengue with someone who could lead was more than 30 years ago, too. And that’s when the map of my body comes to my rescue…

 my senses do not forget.

I still move to the sounds of the crickets and close my eyes to smell the waves.

I walk on Punta Garza with my nonna, in search of caracoles.

Mi Nonna.

Golden

…. except what prompts the memory now is noticing yellow autumn leaves in New York, - el otoño collected into my treasure chest of memorialized sensations after my body became a new map-

 My languaging is sometimes shaped into cracked bolitas of dough, the “mantecaditos” with mami of my childhood, after my itty index finger made the hole for sprinkles, but in this case the “cracks” can be found in hybridized versions of idiomatic expressions - I never remember if it’s the sombrero or the shoe that has to fit for a person to identify themselves with an experience

the gulf - Sanibel Island, FL 2013

 - it braids itself with blended meanings - a mix of sour sweet and salty-

 salty like the tears when I miss smelling el Mar…

 loud like my papi’s laugher,

 incomplete,

 dinámico,

 poético ,,,

 así es… mi lenguajeo …

Las sombras del mundo.