Prologue When I Learned to Swim Before my brother, Matti, is born
before I learn how to keep secrets,
before I learn what my name means
and how it ties me to the water,
Papi teaches me how to swim.
Mami is away in the Dominican Republic
visiting family and friends she hasn’t seen in years.
I am six and still afraid of everything.
Papi knows Mami won’t like it.
But he decides it’s time for me to learn.
The First Time
I tremble near the edge of a pool.
My knees KnOcK
kNoCk
KnOcK
against each other.
A warm August wind w h o o s h e s
through my tangled curls,
I almost let go of my Minnie
Mouse towel when––
Papi nudges me
a little closer to the edge.
I jUmP back
as if the pool is a sinkhole of blue flames.
I squeal
a high-pitched trumpet tingling my tonsils:
No, no, no! I don’t want the water in my eyes in my nose in my lungs. Mami says that the water . . . Sssh mi reina, no pasa nada. Papi sits me on his lap,
tells me a cuento para calmarme.
Papi: The first time I swam in the green rivers of el campo, the current slapped me around until my arms began to flip and my legs began to flap and suddenly I was flying underwater. Your body will know how to handle the water as long as you don’t resist it. Jumping In
Papi’s big brown arms
wrap around my waist.
His warm breath tickles
my ear and his black beard
sweeps against my cheek.
Papi whispers:
Concentrate–– Reach your arms out, then pull them apart as if you are parting the purple curtains in your room. Kick your legs like a drummer’s hands when they paddle their palms on a Palo drum. Imagine your body is a feather and you’ll float. Let the water hold you. Remember, yo estoy aquí. He squeezes my hand.
1
2
3!
We jump in.
The Island (& Me): May My Island We live on an island.
The island where we live
is an o u t s t r e t c h e d arm reaching
into the Gulf of Mexico.
Galveston:
Where the streets are lined
with papel picado houses
in peacock green and
pomegranate pink.
Hundreds of shotgun houses
where the wind whistles
in through the front door and shoots
directly down the hallways
out the back.
Hundreds of houses
in sherbet colors that remind Mami
of “back home.”
But this is the only home
I’ve ever known.
On Sundays before church,
I like to walk to the seawall,
alone,
and watch the sunrise explode
in the sky like cascarones
on Easter.
Blue, pink, and orange colors
confetti the horizon and kiss the sea.
Sometimes, I don’t know
if the ocean is the sky
or the sky is the ocean.
It opens
BIG
W I D E
E N D L E S S.
The way I do
when I swim.
Sometimes, I think that if
I swim long enough
I’ll reach that cascarón sky
and instead of swimming
I’ll begin to S O A R.
Wants Me Close Some Sundays
after church, Mami,
Matti, and me
go to the beach.
Sometimes I build
sandcastles with Matti.
Sometimes, if Papi
is with us and goes
in the water with me,
Mami lets me S W I M.
Mami doesn’t like it
that I swim underwater
so far away from her.
I try to tell her:
Papi taught me how to hold my breath, stroke my arms, and kick my fins, like a dolphin. I’ll be fine. Still––
shewantsmeclose.
She’s afraid la mar
will swallow me up
the way it swallowed
her brother
her house and
her village
during a storm long ago
when she was just a girl.
Mami calls the ocean
“la mar” instead of “el mar”
because she believes
the ocean is a strong woman
who gives and takes life
when she wants.
The ocean will betray you she says.
I try to tell her:
I am Ani de las aguas I swim with the dolphins. The water and I protect each other. She won’t take me away from you. Still––
shewantsmeclose.
Birth Story Mami says when I was born,
I almost drowned
in the ocean of her belly
and they had to C U T me out.
I was not ready
for the world,
would not latch,
would not eat,
would not stop crying.
So they slipped tubes
through my nose
and fed me food
that was not Mami’s milk.
Mami says this made her worry
we would not bond
and I would not have enough
of what I needed to grow
big and strong.
And sometimes I worry
she was right.
Copyright © 2023 by Jasminne Mendez. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
