Mercado

by Frances Trevino


Today Mamá and I drive downtown
past pecan trees making whisper sounds,
take the dusty rose Cadillac
park far in the back of calle Pecos La Trinidad
by El Mercado, y en esta dia estamos comprando.
And the year is 1961 when wooden booths
and stands carried eggs and sweet pan,
leche quemada, and caramel flan.
Other stands carried metates, molcajetes,
and cast iron skillet pans.
Mamá would take out her thick cotton sack
and move right along with her plan of attack,
onions, olive oil, salt, cilantro,
potatoes, pepper corns, garlic, comino.
She’d haggle with Mr. Peña, the produce vendor,
I’ll give you a dollar for all the ones bruised,
and he’d look at her, half insulted, half amused,
he’d tell her, Señora, claro que sí, you do me
good business, taking these from me,
and then they’d wink at the inside joke
and I’d wonder what next Mamá would provoke.
Because next we buy fruit, some soft, some firm,
the sweetest, most luscious, she would discern,
like the anthropologist searching for sacred bones,
like the geologist searching for lost stones,
Mamá would scavenge the wooden fruit stand
until she held the perfect avocado in her soft and strong hand.
Eso! she’d say, but, it’s a little bruised…
and then the fruit vendor, half insulted, half amused
would give a small break on already the cost
my Mamá counted every small victory not lost.
And finally for the top of the thick cotton sack
on to the dulces, the booths toward the back
and Mamá allowed me to pick sweets from the stands
so I chose pineapple, some sweet potato and . . .
Ya!  Bastante!  She’d yell without shame,
Porque ya estas gorda! And your father’s to blame!
But I didn’t worry ‘cause at home I’d find
she’d snuck in some extra, had it there all the time.
Our day now is done at the market of the sun,
driving home at 15 miles per hour in 1961,
driving to our little house downtown
back toward pecan trees making whisper sounds.
Mamá, me, and the thick cotton sack.
Us, low and slow, in a rose Cadillac.