I Understand
poem - 2020
Age 3,
Ture playing cuatro,
Nito playing guitar,
Miguel swinging Cijin,
Magda and Luis flirting with insults,
los mayores en sus sillas, velando todo,
and I, a toddler in my mother’s arms,
watching it all happen.
I didn’t know what was happening at the time,
But I understood.
Age 12,
Pulling up to a Rincón birthday,
and seeing a family of cousins
spread over a mountainside,
like so many palm trees.
I didn’t speak Spanish.
I didn’t know what was happening at the time,
But when I looked at my hands, I understood.
Age 14,
We sleep over Margo's.
I am falling more and more in love with the coquis.
“Titi,” I ask, “Can I sleep outside?”
She responds, “But there’s air conditioning inside?”
I tell her, “I want to sleep en la ‘maca, like a real jibaro.”
She laughs, Pues, duerme bien jibaro!”
I didn’t know what was happening at the time.
Twenty minutes later,
I walk into a chorus of women’s laughter
at the 15-odd mosquito bites on my legs and arms.
I understood.
Age 16,
Luis asks me, in English,
to smell a leaf of fresh tobacco
which he had cultivated that morning.
I gave him the answer I thought he was looking for:
“Ew, Tio.” He laughed.
During that same trip,
he tells me,
“The greatest joy a man can feel
Is providing for his family
That which he grows with his hands.”
I knew it was a test.
I didn’t understand what he was testing.
Age 17,
Luis’s open casket is in his living room.
Magda, turning rice in the kitchen,
crying as women hold her.
All the men outside pour drinks and sip coffee,
telling stories about my tio that I couldn’t understand.
At one point,
we all go to the living room
and semi-circle around Luis.
A man who is not Ture plays the cuatro.
A man who is not Nito plays the guitar.
Another plays the congas.
Another sings décimas.
We all sing coro.
I didn’t know.
I felt everything.
I understood.
Age 17,
I return home
to New Jersey.
To suburban fences.
To double locks.
To anonymous neighbors.
To staggered dinners: 6 pm, 8 pm, 1 am.
To dusty chairs in the dining room.
To a mother in one room, asleep.
To a father at/on his way to/or on his way from work.
I call out bendición,
Y no hay nadie que me bendiga.
Age 26,
I go to my first Puerto Rican house party with my band members.
I walk through the door: “Eyyyyyy, Chris!”
It takes 15 minutes of saludos and besos to get to the kitchen.
Nanette serves me arroz y habichuelas and cracks on Juan
who serves me a shot and a beer.
Hamlet tells a story that Viannca riffs on five times over,
flailing her arms as she does it.
Kiki chases the smaller kids from room to room
teaching them how to behave.
Mateo and Rosa compete over who can tell
the best Medalla story about their dad.
Tania brings Papo a plate
and Hamlet brings him a beer.
When I sit next to him and say,
“Salud,” he says, “Que Dios te bendiga, papa.
Keep playing, even if you get nervous.
Music is a wonderful feeling, and you sound great.”
At some point, I grab a drum.
Someone else grabs another.
Someone else grabs another.
Someone grabs a maraca.
Someone else grabs los cuás.
We start to play and sing and dance.
I know now.
I understand.
