MARI-CARMEN MARIN - POEMS

Mari-Carmen Marin was born in the Spanish Mediterranean city of Málaga and moved to Houston, TX, in August 2003, after she received a PhD in African American literature at the University of Zaragoza (Spain). She is currently a professor of English at Lone Star College—Tomball, and enjoys drawing, reading, and writing poetry in her spare time. One of her poems, “The Girl at the Window,” was published in Beth MacDonald’s Premier Issue of Wordriver Literary Review, in Spring 2009.

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THE AMERICAN DREAM
August 24, 2003, 6 a.m. Málaga Airport, Spain ​

​You
get on
the plane,
 still teary,
 tired. Two
   flight    
attendants,
Dressed
in well-pressed  
blue uniforms
say, “Buenos   días.”  
With   Colgate
smiles, they point
at your seat –7B– 
 next to the aisle. 
You place 
your brand-new 
bolsa de piel
 at your feet.
Reluctant you are

to separate 
from the farewell  
present your mom  
gave you – the present  
only item to keep  
you rooted now. 
You sit, buckle up,
 wait . . . 

Puffy-eyed passengers line up, looking for a place to drop their dragging bodies and rest  for   the   next  ten hours.  The  captain  speaks  words  too  fast  to  grasp.   The crew   starts  a  robot–like  routine  to  the  beat of    a   safety    video.   You                                                                                                                cringe   in   your   seat.

The plane first walks,
then sprints,
and leaves
the ground,
with eagle grace.
You stop
breathing . . .
‘til no more
movement
threatens
to steal
 your sense
 of balance.
You close your eyes . . .

                             In the dark room of your thoughts             you see a part of yourself
                amputated                                                                                                                and left behind.
 
 

​THE NAKED CHILD

​She hides in the crammed attic of my childhood
memories, behind the old wood dresser
with white drawers and orange knobs
where I kept my collection of conch shells –
those filled with waves of ocean whispers
crashing against the silence of my bedroom
on Sunday evenings.
 
Longing to be found, she sits on the cold floor
curled up; her glassy eyes scream
in the darkness enveloping her
like a cloak too big for her nine-year-old body.
Yet, no tears run down her cheeks,
no sobs escape her lips. Subdued they’ve been
by layer upon layer of neglect.
 
I’ve paid for my negligence, though.
I’ve cried her thwarted tears,
I’ve shaken with her choked-back sobs.
I’ve been a puppet of a girl puppeteer
tangled in strings she cannot control.
 
She pulls; I hang;
She yanks; I yank back
‘till sore and breathless,
we hug, sitting on the cold floor
curled up, behind the old wood dresser
with white drawers and orange knobs.
We meet each other’s eyes,
glassy eyes, whose voice will no more be hushed.

​THE SCARLET LETTER

At birth, “Sin” was imprinted
on my skin. A capital “S” 
had to be washed up by the baptismal waters
when I was only two months old.
“How much sin can there be in babies’ dreams?”
I asked my mom years later.
“It all comes back to Adam and Eve,”
she said, and I believed.
I grew up scared of sneaky snakes
and the red-eyed devil dressed up as an angel,
alluring us to the dark side
where fire consumes the flesh,
and turns bones and souls to ash.
 
 
I prayed at night - knees down by the side of my bed,
eyes closed, palms touching each other - 
went to church on Sunday mornings,
learned all about guilt, sacrifice,
submission, suffering and forgiveness,
turned to Mary, Mother of all, for compassion
and Jesus, her Son, for strength,
But the “S” always resurfaced and had to be washed away.
 
My first confession happened in the month of May
when I was nine. It stole my sleep the previous night:
I told a lie, I talked back to dad,
I called my sister names, I got angry at mom…
The list got recorded and repeated in my mind.
Was that all?
What if I forget a sin and go to hell? or what is worse,
What if I lie again and talk back,
and insult, and can’t keep myself calm?
Would I have to confess again? 
Isn’t repenting after the fact good enough?
It wasn’t, I learned. Only those clean of sins
were worthy of tasting the body and blood of Christ.
 
Fearful of my human side, I turned inward
and lived in my head, where I was safe from harm.
I made up imaginary boyfriends when I yearned
to be kissed and touched, but I denied my wants.
Wasn’t touching a sin, wasn’t kissing a sign of lust? 
I’m not married, I’m too young to become a mom,
Carnal desire is the snake in disguise…
Get away from it, or the snake will bite.
 
It lasted until the twenty-fourth year of my life.
It happened slowly; I didn’t see it come.
First was the warmth of his hand on mine
while teaching me how to grab the mouse,
his wide and long fingers, his veins
grooving his darker skin, pumping out his blood.
Next was his soft lips brushing my left ear,
when talking to me in a whisper.
Then a poem, hand-written in a paper napkin
secretly placed in between my notes.
Finally, a glass of wine by the harbor,
the sun setting behind the horizon,
his eyes fixed on mine, undressing me,
one garment at a time until I was naked,
wanted to be covered by his arms.
We hugged; he placed his hand
on my cheek; I placed my hand on his,
and caught in a magnetic field of desire,
our lips clutched, locking in our tongues
engaged in a tribal dance.
 
Restless waves crashed against the sea-wall
that witnessed my first taste of Sin. I cried,
          not tears of fear, not tears of regret,
          not tears of guilt, or tears of shame.
They were just … tears,
                                         judgment-free,
                                                                       pure,
                                                                                  Sinless
                                                                                                Sincere.