La Bamba (1987) Without An Ending

tonight, the pretend and the real

and the credits roll and fate never turns

and doctor it, go limb by limb. I see endings

I face the world. I want to swallow entire countries

the marimba and guitars going down

on skin. Suppose in this version of the

reanimate, become impossible angels. The memorials

and I get to be a mother, get to keep my mother

the tree-lined path from San Fernando’s shining son,

at Christmas, we steamed corn husks &

and playing in God’s house. I remember her

on birthdays, stereo and cassette tape mariachis

mopping richer ladies’ floors on Sundays,

stitching labels onto women’s underwear. Even in

from above, mountain grasses at her hips,

for anything, for the way the world was

comes. A film reel whirls, and this is

but we’re gathered here on our feet, and

in. Somewhere we exist where we’re young,

and in last rooms, auditoriums and living

on the TV screen, white girls dancing

but dancing, and for a moment there, too,

Suppose his smiling face

stays there onstage,

like ignored meat.

I take the past 

every time 

so I swallow

my family line, 

like a stitch 

Grotesque,

the folk songs 

are murals 

& my abuelita,

buried down 

and I remember 

banana leaves,

folding time over 

singing 

like a legacy

She hummed 

on weekdays 

the canyon,

her waving 

me, praying 

before

the final scene 

not a funeral 

a guitar riff

Nosedives 

in first 

rooms,

songs & sons

offbeat

abuelitas swaying

& swaying