“Basique” - Little People

There's a sense of calm that being here brings me that no where on this earth can imitate. A pleasure of sitting barefoot on tile floor, french doors open to an old city where the scent of hot asphalt rises slowly as it begins to rain transporting me to an 8-year-old version of myself whose imagination could flood the cobble-stoned streets of her world twice over.

In my last month living in San Jose before my departure, I remember falling asleep on the 72 bus headed to work. I couldn't have dozed off longer than a few minutes at most, but when I sat up and looked out the window, half asleep, half in a panic that I had missed my stop all I saw was Her mountains. The slow, lazy slope of El Yunque as if her old arms were open to me, calling. Shocked, I held my breath, completely encapsulated in that image of being home, where fear and pain and disillusion held no home within me. For I was saturated in her entity, unable to hold not another ounce of love. But as I became fully awake, I realized what I saw was not El Yunque, but instead the Santa Cruz hills. I closed my eyes, choking back the tears that threatened to spill over the edge and into the hands of a woman who suddenly felt distant, older, and all at once less apart of this world.

Driving up the old, unevenly paved road that lead to our home, I once again closed my eyes and let my heart go back to that moment so that when I opened them, that dream could blend the seams of where hope met reality. I was finally home again.

In the 8 days since I've arrived, I have seen the town in which my Abuela was born, raised, and left to pursuit a better life in San Juan. I have bathed in buckets of rain water, feasted on Sunday's best lechon, been baptized in the waves of Luquillo, comeo un mayora y cafe con leche en la bombonera, listened to those marching in protest of Obama coming and to those who praised his work. And within these moments came a sharp and strong realization: That I am Mariel Eleni Valerio, daughter of Michael Dominic Valerio and Rosalina Lugo Valerio. Child, poet, y una boriqua. There is still so much for me to see, to taste, to write about, to cry over, to rebuild. It will come, I know the answers I seek are within myself. But for now....

 I will remember the lights of the bay, small out of focus halos.

 I will promise to capture those moments only now, right now can bring.

The laughter.

The food and the hands who make it.

 The movement of life,

 Held in a machete that meets

Coconut and rotting wood.

Dirty milk spilling onto overworked flesh

For a few moments of joy.

 To be shared among only a few.

 A feast for a poor king

 The spice of life, blood red.

 Ending in a miracle and the evening song of roosting pigeons.

I'm finally home again.