Where I Am From

Where I Am From

LINK TO VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYtIjAqohA4

I come from cello, tres leches and matzo ball soup,

And where the seas meet,

I am from the green of Central Park,

Chipotle on our laps as we whispered of the future.

I come from the clicking of his camera and her fabric draped over mannequins,

Her hats and his law books,

My sister’s tiny hand wrapped around my finger as she sleeps.

 

I come from Parcheesi,

From the watering can,

From the stretch in my neck from gazing at the Natural History’s dinosaurs,

From nights under the covers with Jane Austen and a flashlight,

Dreaming of becoming like Belle,

From screams in the middle of the night as he hallucinated,

His blue eyes unseeing as time stole away his mind,

I come from a raven-haired sister

Taking apart clocks and building robots

Trying to make everyone laugh,

And from a hazel-eyed sister

Reading books and listening to jazz,

Gentle with animals and people alike.

I am from my mother climbing Mount Sinai with a baby on her back,

Inspiring my aunt to do the same,

Refusing to listen to the tour guide who told her not to.

I am from my father using words to serve justice,

And his telephone conversations with companies about contracts,

Arguing until the world bowed to his will.

 

I come from cataloging vegetation with my best friend in kindergarten,

Dirt beneath our fingernails, faces gleaming with sweat as laughter pierced the air,

And when she came out to me.

I come from five years of braces and lisps,

From my father chopping off my hair,

From their snickers and hisses,

From their ostracizing and their fists

Not knowing which was worse.

I come from the look he gave me above the droning of our teacher,

The squeamish jubilance in my heart when he called me beautiful,

And my gnawing fear of romance that

Prevented anything from truly happening,

I am from the Crash! of my bike and nose splaying with crimson blood

Like a water fountain,

And then getting back on my bike 20 minutes later only to

Crash! into a tree,

And from finding out I broke my nose as I watched the Simpsons.

 

I come from the waves washing over me as

I glide deeper and deeper, becoming another creature of the blue.

From books under trees barefoot

And walks in the pouring rain laughing,

From Under Pressure and Let it Be, and record players

My mother swinging me around as Lennon crooned.

From clicking heels and swaying skirts and hot sauce with her.

I come from the poor Spaniard, who hired a teacher for his hamlet,

And the Baghdadi rabbi murdered for his beliefs.

I come from catching the Torah on my bat mitzvah

After the Rabbi dropped it,

From special omelets in the morning,

And spices of the Far East.

I come from history textbooks and dreams of becoming a lawyer,

From star gazing and strategizing life,

From double eye winks and spumonis under the nighttime sky,

Stars twinkling like diamonds sewn to black satin.