I.
Purple-pink nails
Lips flicker to blue
Gasp for air
Born of asthma
And clubfoot, feet
Twisted, bent
Inverted inward
Downward.
A tía told mom
it is God’s will to accept
That I was 1 of 1000 chosen ones.
But, amá decided to defy
God’s plan, thank god.
Anesthesia
Tender skin
Pierced through.
Major foot reconstruction
Tiny white cast
with pins holding my foot
in place.
The latest Los Bukis song
emanates from dad’s stereo.
I cried to the rhythm
of mucus production
and nostrils widening
Tortured feet
set on fire
by Hernán Cortés.
My breathing stops
until shaken by amá.
Three red tunas appear
from the thorny nopal, now sprouting
from our foreheads
A brown eagle
devours a serpent
towards us.
Birth of a new ending / I was resurrected again.
Osmani R. Alcaraz-Ochoa
Osmani R. Alcaraz-Ochoa is a queer immigrant poet living in San Antonio, Texas committed to social justice. Born in Jalisco, Mexico, and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, they now work at a national non-profit focusing on worker and economic justice. They received their degree in Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University. Osmani currently has forthcoming poetry (2024-2025) scheduled for publication in two Chicano/Latinx sci-fi/speculative anthologies titled: “Chicanofuturism Now! Visions of a Raza Future” edited by Scott Russell Duncan (press TBA) and “Not Your Papi’s Utopia: Latinx Visions of Radical Hope” edited by Alex Hernández, Sara Daniele Rivera, and Matthew David Goodwin (Mouthfeel Press). Osmani has also published poems in La Raíz Magazine, Voices de la Luna, Strange Horizons, and Windward Review.
Photo By: Chris Summitt
