This river here

by Carmen Tafolla


This river here
is full of me and mine.
This river here
is full of you and yours.

Right here
(or maybe a little farther down)
my great-grandmother washed the dirt
out of her family’s clothes,
soaking them, scrubbing them,
bringing them up
clean.

Right here
(or maybe a little farther down)
my grampa washed the sins
out of his congregation’s souls,
baptizing them, scrubbing them,
bringing them up
clean.

Right here
(or maybe a little farther down)
my great-great grandma froze with fear
as she glimpsed,
between the lean, dark trees,
a lean, dark Indian peering at her.
She ran home screaming, “Ay, los Indios!
A’i vienen los I-i-indios!!”
as he threw pebbles at her,
laughing.

’Til one day she got mad
and stayed
and threw pebbles
right back at him!

After they got married,
they built their house right here
(or maybe a little farther down.)

Right here,
my father gathered
mesquite beans and wild berries
working with a passion
during the depression.
His eager sweat poured off
and mixed so easily
with the water of this river here.

Right here,
my mother cried in silence,
so far from her home,
sitting with her one brown suitcase
and rolling tears of loneliness and longing
which mixed (again so easily)
with the currents of this river here.

Right here we’d pour out picnics,
and childhood’s blood from
dirty scrapes on dirty knees,
and every generation’s first-hand stories
of the weeping lady, La Llorona,
haunting the river every night,
crying “Ayyy, mis hi-i-i-ijos!” –
(It happened right here!)

The fear dripped off our skin
and the blood dripped off our scrapes
and they mixed with the river water,
right here.

Right here,
the stories and the stillness
of those gone before us
haunt us still,
now grown, our scrapes in different places,
the voices of those now dead
quieter,
but not too far away. . . .

Right here we were married,
you and I,
and the music filled the air,
danced in,
dipped in,
mixed in
with the river water.

     . . . dirt and sins,
     fear and anger,
     sweat and tears,
     love and music,
     blood.
     And memories. . . .

It was right here!

And right here we stand,
washing clean our memories,
baptizing our hearts,
gathering past and present,
dancing to the flow
we find
right here
or maybe –
a little farther
down.