TAGO NG TAGO (TNT)

Because my cousins kept telling him to watch out,
my cousin was terrified of wall cavities, attics,
and crawl spaces—anywhere snakes could build a den.
Firewood piles, banks strewn with garbage,
and dilapidated tires made him wet his pants,
though I can’t say, because of what we did,
that he was gullible. Once, my cousins, thrilled
with rubber fakes, snaked the hallway
and waited for him to power on the lights.
He scrambled onto his bike and sprinted
from their house to ours, where we were no better,
shrieking Watch out! as mambas, like concertinas,
extended from our open door. Our poor cousin,
we’d say. And Kawawa naman when he laid low
beneath the bottom bunk, waiting to jump
Surprise! at his “mother” who we knew
was not his mother. I believed them once and one time
hid under the bunk with my fingers clamping
my eyes shut when they said I could catch conjunctivitis
just by making eye contact—but even I
knew that their mother was saving up in the States
and that the woman holding her hand out
to him was a family friend. But he stood quietly,
his shirt ironed and tucked, a good, good boy
in line with his stand-in mother at the passport office,
while we were vigilant about saying nothing
that might set him off. Just minutes after           
we stepped out of the car, my cousins held
my head back, pointed at my Eve’s apple, the bobbing
arch of my throat, and said disclosing
too much would make it explode.

with the woman
standing in as his mother and we were careful
to not say anything that might set him off.

I was the youngest, the baby of the family

and we

tucked in his shirt and waited quietly

You have to be careful, they said, to not say anything

            that might set him off.

  coming

reaching her hand out to my cousin was a

            was making a living in the States, saving up
to one day fly them all and that the woman

 I’d seen her

 
eyes closed when my brothers said I could catch
pink eye

 
but even I knew their mother
            lived in the States.

 
Their mother, even I knew, because I’d seen her,

crying like the baby
of the family. Kawawa naman,

for his mother
who lived in the States.

bed where I would hide with my eyes closed

  under the bed where 

scared
him.

a nest

See, my cousin, I explained, was afraid
of snakes because my cousins kept telling him
to watch out. They strew his room once with snakes
while shrieking “Watch out!” to his face so I can’t
really say he was gullible. They were fake,
but he ran from their house to ours where we,
            too, had shoveled a den for plastic snakes.
So awful, I know, but it’s okay if you
            want to laugh. We cousins turned out okay.

and my friend couldn’t tell
            if it was appropriate to laugh

whether to laugh along with me, or

Maybe he was gullible,
but with snakes
and yelled “Watch out!” at his face.

hallway to his room

Watch out when you lock the door
            behind you, watch out when you walk home alone.

Watch out!, they said to his face

bathroom
            door

,

            the they said to his face,

When he biked to our house,
when he played G.I. Joe’s

was gullible.


On a visit home after falling in love,
            I was what you might call, in love,
corresponding thrice a day


I would’ve said what was true
And what wasn’t, but I’d already said too much.

return to twelve

I wake to the sound of my neighbors upstairs as if they are bowling.
And maybe they are, all pins and love fallen over.
I lay against my floor, if only to feel that kind of affection.
What I’ve learned, time and again:
Get up. You can not have what they have.
And the eyes of a dead rat can’t say anything.
In Jersey, the sink breaks and my mother keeps a bucket
underneath to save water for laundry.
A trickle of water is no joke. I’ve learned that.
Neither is my father, wielding a knife in starlight.
I was taught that everything and everyone is self-made.
That you can make a window out of anything if you want.
This is why I froze insects. To see if they will come back to life.
What is made and un-made.
And yet, each morning, the starting out, the ants pouring out
of the sink, onto my arms in dish water.
My arms: branches. A swarm I didn’t ask for.
No one told me I’d have to learn to be polite, to let myself be consumed.
I must return to my younger self.
To wearing my life like heavy wool, 
weaved in myself. And when debtors come to collect, 
I will pretend not to know.

SCRAPBOOK

after ladan osman

i. look—in the middle distance the siren screams
like a fatherless boy, 

unashamed. ii. sisyphus hikes up her dress. 
she labors pushing,

always a man,

and if she shrugs, he rolls atop her
or the town at the foot of the hill. or a man, calling himself sisyphus, knocks
and says: push is a man’s verb 

but she can help. or else, 

he says, quiet. iii. it’s said we are afraid
of what we don’t understand. who 

among us is shaken by latin? we are terrified of what might
overtake us. sadness, marriage, spanish, 

rain. iv. like a sextant he angled himself as if
(as if!) to kiss. his hands in the ocean of her
eyes and his knee pressed against the air 

like a rudder. v. how can i make you 
understand? as a boy i held a bell in my hand. and i grew

to be a man who looks back

on that bell. vi. what is there
to say? that was yesterday. vii. the first thing odysseus decides
when he returns is to cock his bow. fire

in the crowd. over and again, bullets move 
at flirtatious angles. viii. in the city, the first november rain

laps at a set of heels. ix. a family of plantains. 
no one speaks

their name. actually,

a silence, even when they are perfect and brown. 
every domestic, familiar, 

unpretty thing. x. i’ll say it again:

if a hand is big enough it doesn’t matter 
what you call it. xi. the story of orpheus and the bear is this—
orpheus, of course,

sings. his wife is distinguished
by her marriedness

to orpheus. jumping ahead: he left behind his clothing, his furniture
and everything. xii. there is an old story 

of a man. that is the story.

there is an old story of a woman
that the old story of the man spoke over.
i am his son. xiii. imagine here the voice 

of a woman. xiv. a list of all that is fixed:
only the ground.