I was boxing the other day
with about 55 minutes of Trip Hop
It threw a right hook, nearly knocked me on my ass
if I could I would have kicked the beat, but my foot was on the gas

It reminded me of us
trying to find the best secondbest
Mexican food this side of a chainlink fence
Instead we found a man my father knew before he was my dad
when my padre’s padres used to take him and his siblings out to dance

Nineteen
is a number
Too high
in my head
to count
in Spanish
2 close for foreign language,
so I switch to English instead

You were an African Whiteboy, but
I was the least Mexican thing in the room
until an old lady bussing tables spotted me
and smiled the fuck out of her 3 remaining teeth
and recognized me as someone who would recognize her as

La Abuelita:
Tiny Grandmother Spirit
whose warmth bakes adobe bricks
whose song is the good parts of the desert
whose helping hand is the Angels in the Outfield of the Kitchen
lifting every heavy ladle which scoops beans onto a child’s plate

And after dinner OR on a completely different day OR
(As time origamis into a box) at that exact same moment
I dreamed a world of wax walls
melting birthday candle clown faces
colored lines, a taxicab and the ubiquitous
even-now-I-see-it-so-clearly
Legless Ivory Zebra Dueling Pistol

I’m amazed at how stark and vivid these memories are
There were plenty of people who came over that week
but when you weren’t there, there was no one there
So now I ask you, Argonaut, are you not not here?