by David Hernandez
A boy runs into a busy street,
a boy who happens to be my father.
Yes he’s careless and yes here comes
the taxicab. This happened
in Bogotá, Colombia. And this:
a boy falls, a boy who happens
to be my father, fallen before
the taxicab. You know what
happens next: my existence
spoils the drama. How the taxicab
glides over my father and skims
his shoulder blades. He stands
unscathed and brushes the dust off
his clothes and continues to breathe.
Fallen differently, I’m not here.
Fallen the way he did, I am.
When the boy who happens to be
my father runs into a busy street,
I’m in the backseat of that taxicab
with my brother and sister.
The three of us, we’re outlined.
Our skin is translucent as cellophane.
When we begin to scream
nothing but nothing leaps
from the zeros of our mouths.
Such is how the future lives
without influencing the world.
And my mother? She’s the girl
hundreds of miles south, blowing
air into a plastic ring skinned
with water and soap. The flimsy
bubbles lift. Whether they are
pushed into a wall, the spikes
of branches, or the sky’s blue field,
it is up to the wind.
