From “Celestial House”

The following poems and collages were created for Victoria Martinez’s solo show, Celestial House, at Loyola University Museum of Art (LUMA) as odes to the homes and Chicago neighborhoods the artists grew up in. All collages are by Victoria Martinez and all poems are by José Olivarez.

 

Nation of Domination

my mom hugs me & wants me to stay. i have my foot
on the pedal. a fake gold chain on my neck. i confess
i’m a sucker. i never want magicians to reveal their secrets.
i want to live in the unknowing where everything is possible.
my mom dances with me to Los Bukis. she thinks this makes
me her baby still. perspective is a magic trick. i hit my brother
with the Rock Bottom & i bet you can guess what i leave out.
ask Farooq if you need a hint. the brain is full of magic
i don’t understand. no one signs up to take a dive. in wrestling,
there’s a team of writers who decide who wins and who loses.
the metaphor is obvious. my mom wasn’t born to play the role
of mom, i don’t care how many baby dolls she played with.
i dance with my mom to Los Bukis & you’re a fool
if you believe it’s her son she’s trying to hold on to.


 

moonshine

the poets are right about the moonlight.
i take my spot of sky & deposit it
into a savings account. only after
the bank confiscated our house
did i understand. roses
don’t grow without pricked hands.
i didn’t have to spend a summer in a freezer
packing lunch meat to know the value
of sunlight. my mom didn’t have
to spend a decade wiping down floors to appreciate
education. when i give you a bouquet of roses,
i give you a bouquet of bloody hands.
a handful of dirt & the worms that doted on your roses.
when i take my piece of sky out of the bank,
it’s smaller. the drunks are right about moonshine.


 

Shelter Island

frigid are the branches of black trees cutting through
a blacker night. missing are the lampposts that adorn
every few feet of New York. cold is your hand in my hand
& yes, i am a man, & you are a woman. my wilderness
is not unlike the woods that surround us. the sky in my wild
lit by lanterns in the faces of animals. my own flammable face.
my father’s temperament. my thrifted excuse. yes,
it’s the night before 45 is sworn in as president,
& yes, we leave the city, & we would leave the planet, too.
you hold my hand & we walk into the teeth of the hour
armed with each other. bitter cold is the world we leave behind.
when we hold hands, we invent a spaceship.