I Remember Lotería
I remember nights of playing
*Lotería* w/Mom & Big Manny
as a way to learn the Spanish they spoke
to each other but not to their kids
who caught on to certain words
like *cállate*, *cerveza*, *chicharrón*;
little nuggets I ate up
like the pinto beans we used
instead of the blue chips
Mom kept in her Bingo bag
she carried every Friday night
when her & Tia Shirley
went to the Moose Lodge,
her hair & coat reeking
w/the smoke of all who lost.

I remember *El Borracho*,
the man always holding a bottle
& about to fall over yet never does
like Big Manny stumbling home
late at night after a payday,
breath & belly full of beer,
who one time took a piss
in our bedroom.
I remember *La Garza*,
not for the heron it is
but cousin Tony & his kids,
nights of sleepovers & pizza,
PlayStation on a 40-inch TV,
the night he & Lil Jesse sneaked
bumps of coke in the bathroom
& I rubbed numb my teenage teeth.

I remember *El Musico*,
not the chubby man clutching his *guitarra*
but my brother Dave loading crates
of records & a dual turntable case
like a coffin into the back of a van,
the same set I hit my back on at ten
when I fell out of the top bunk bed.

But I prefer to remember *La Sirena*
back when her breasts were free
of the seashells she now holds
to cover them in water so blue
cold, her scales so red,
her name clung to the tongue
like *dulce de leche*.