Borders
Quelle: Spotify
It starts before she gets here.
Before the stares tell her she's alien to a country that knows her great grandfather's Mexican hands all too well.
His fingerprints still echo underneath railroad tracks and cotton fields from Texas to California,
where bent knees and bent backs, once picked, plucked, pushed, worked; for more money than he was used to but less than he deserved.
For Ana Maria, it begins before the border.
She walks with her two uncles and Abuela through the dessert for one week with nothing more than a few gallons of water and a prayer tucked into their pockets hoping both will last them long enough.
The sun is an unforgiving God, but any God is worth having worth right now.
The wind pushing at their backs is the grunt of gun shots from drug cartels and the desperation of a job to employ their stomachs, both have been uninvited guests at their door step.
So they step, step.
Ana Maria's small hand clutches the bottom of her Abuela's dress.
Her mother waits for her on the other side, hoping that her face still sings of home like it use to.
Another step. She is too young to know what "border" means.
She thinks that people are just family members who haven't met yet.
After her family arrives, she will learn that there are some borders you can't cross by foot.
Ana Maria is now 10 years old.
She's learned enough English to translate for her parents, but says that her thick accent is still a problem she tries to fix by leaving in her locker.
When the teacher calls on her to read she tries to speak proper, like "proper" has a sound.
She pushes her tongue down so she doesn't roll her R's but she trips on the syllables that bounce with too much salsa.
She tries to rattle out the kinks in her speech, but her tongue is a stubborn dancer.
The two boys behind her don't know how to do long division, but they know what a wetback is.
And that Ana maria has braids
and that Ana Maria's hair is thicker than their sisters.
And they don't know how they know, but they know how to treat difference when they smell it so, they say things like
"Go back to your country", as if they Irish ancestors never walked through Ales Island.
Ana Maria is now 16.
Her father works 18 hour days as a dish washer.
Her mother cleans houses she'll never get to live in, so that Ana Maria can sit in a college classroom and say,
"I am here." But her guidance councilor tells her, she can't get financial aid or the in-state tuition rate because of her status.
She says it like an apology.
Ana wonders, if her family ever crossed the border, or if they are just stuck inside another one, aggravating it like a sore.
Her guidance councilor stands in front of her with a mouth full of fences.
There are some border you can't cross by foot.
"But borders", I tell her, "that can only be crossed by stubborn backbone."
So if they ask for your papers Ana, show them your skin
Anna, wear your tongue like cape
Throw up your fist like a secret you can't keep any longer.
They can't keep you any longer.
Afraid you can't afford to drive or dream so if they come for you, tell them, tell them
Tell them, in the language that you know best, that you, are not scared anymore!
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