Mi Casita
By Melissa Espinoza
I love home most when:
When I am nearest to your scalp
When I infest sweet lungs that scream just for me
When I am lording over salt infested flames, y también con mucho mucho mucho pimiento
When my feet make contact with frozen synthetic wood, firm firm firm against my soles
When babies breath gets caught in my nostrils, full brown baby breath I must drink in
When words slit open my fingerprints, good burns that are grotesquely good
When words stumble and fall and devour past my lips, past everything that is you
Though Home is still
When whiteness blinds me of all reason, reason a perverse masculine lord
With overly sweet blood, please poison me sweetly
When cloth can never smooth out enough, conceal conceal conceal
When the heat finally sets itself up under my eyelids, warming up the cold thoughts I’d carefully
harvested all winter long
When the desert dust is kicked up into the air
Making my sweat
Dripping mud
Dripping onto sweet cactus dreams
Melissa Espinoza is currently a MA candidate within the Literature program at New Mexico State University. Melissa is currently most interested in works of Feminist and Chicanx writing but also enjoys poetry and cultural literary criticism. As a Chicana writer, she hopes to bring her love of her mother tongue into her writing and showcase her roots within her many works.