with her small hands
she strung chiles into ristras
and twisted rags into rugs
under her mother’s guidance
she once rode a wild horse named azul
without her brother’s permission
only to encounter a low-hanging tree limb
(and her brother’s wrath)
she swam naked in the rio grande
and had to walk home in the nude
when los indios stole the clothes
she had left on the riverbank
(she got in trouble for that too)
and sometimes she picked sugar beets
with her mother and brothers
in a land far from home
to earn money to make good on taxes
owed to the government
to keep it from taking their ancestral land
(which it did anyway)
these are the stories my mother told
of her childhood that have often made me
wonder how such experiences shaped
the life of the person i came to know
(or perhaps never really knew)
though in truth there is one story
that has given me some clarity
it is about the adobe house
my mother lived in
i was surprised to learn that
it had a dirt floor inside which
my mother assured me the family
swept every day to keep clean
(why bother sweeping a dirt floor
i remember thinking at the time)
but now when i look back
and think of the stubborn strength
that saw my mother through a life
that was never easy
i am beginning to understand