Papi, Papá
I catch my head again.
I expect to see my father
entering a room. I catch
my head starting to turn
and I’m on the disappearing end
of an island, thinking of
the girl from El Salvador
whose sentences
are polite in a recording
from migrant detention.
They identify countries
of origin, not names. A crying
boy from Guatemala
says Papi, Papi, Papá. Dad, Daddy,
Father, I miss you. Please walk
through the door again.
Please inhabit your body.
Does he construct
a memory or a daydream
where his father, wearing the last
outfit he was seen in, enters
from the other side of a cage?
When I try to rebuild my father
it’s his hair first, his shoulders, scenarios
of posture. I couldn’t look at
the last thing he wore. I had
the chance I could not do it.
A child doesn’t understand
separation. Absence is
transformed into a game: disappearance,
reappearance, a face
behind hands. I was there
the morning my father
crossed an undeniable border
and a boy is at the border now.
He catches his head
turning, looking
to the door and back, Papi,
Papá and the country beyond
the facility is desert and
wire and everything, everything
in this wide, cold
place is a pale-yellow polo,
tucked in at the waist.
A shirt his father wore.
■
I catch my head again.
I expect to see my father
entering a room. I catch
my head starting to turn
and I’m on the disappearing end
of an island, thinking of
the girl from El Salvador
whose sentences
are polite in a recording
from migrant detention.
They identify countries
of origin, not names. A crying
boy from Guatemala
says Papi, Papi, Papá. Dad, Daddy,
Father, I miss you. Please walk
through the door again.
Please inhabit your body.
Does he construct
a memory or a daydream
where his father, wearing the last
outfit he was seen in, enters
from the other side of a cage?
When I try to rebuild my father
it’s his hair first, his shoulders, scenarios
of posture. I couldn’t look at
the last thing he wore. I had
the chance I could not do it.
A child doesn’t understand
separation. Absence is
transformed into a game: disappearance,
reappearance, a face
behind hands. I was there
the morning my father
crossed an undeniable border
and a boy is at the border now.
He catches his head
turning, looking
to the door and back, Papi,
Papá and the country beyond
the facility is desert and
wire and everything, everything
in this wide, cold
place is a pale-yellow polo,
tucked in at the waist.
A shirt his father wore.
■
Hello Friends,
In today’s poem, poet Sara Daniele Rivera recalls her own grief at losing her father while listening to audio recordings of migrant children held in detention at the US-Mexican border. Rivera is a Cuban/Peruvian artist, writer, translator, and educator from Albuquerque, New Mexico. “Papi, Papá” can be found in her collection The Blue Mimes, which won the Academy of American Poets First Book Award.
One way you can support migrant children is by donating to Legal Services for Children, an organization led by Cathy Sakimura that helps secure a path to lawful immigration status for undocumented minors, assists with DACA applications, and supports minors who are in, or have recently been released from, immigration detention. The federal government recently terminated funding for legal representation for unaccompanied children and youth who are here without their parents, cruelly leaving these children to represent themselves in court. Legal Services for Children is currently fighting this termination.
Thank you for celebrating poetry month with me.
— Ællen
In today’s poem, poet Sara Daniele Rivera recalls her own grief at losing her father while listening to audio recordings of migrant children held in detention at the US-Mexican border. Rivera is a Cuban/Peruvian artist, writer, translator, and educator from Albuquerque, New Mexico. “Papi, Papá” can be found in her collection The Blue Mimes, which won the Academy of American Poets First Book Award.
One way you can support migrant children is by donating to Legal Services for Children, an organization led by Cathy Sakimura that helps secure a path to lawful immigration status for undocumented minors, assists with DACA applications, and supports minors who are in, or have recently been released from, immigration detention. The federal government recently terminated funding for legal representation for unaccompanied children and youth who are here without their parents, cruelly leaving these children to represent themselves in court. Legal Services for Children is currently fighting this termination.
Thank you for celebrating poetry month with me.
— Ællen