why they should have called love banana

because the curve of your muscle at the point in your arm where i bury my face is that shape. Because the peel is as thick as the layer of love that must be removed before you carefully place my heart in your mouth. because the strings of white flesh are similar to the ones that hold together the fibers of my soul. the soul that breathes for you. its the concealed insides that could be imagined as a boat for you and i to sail away on. it is the bruises that can be found along the body, soft brown and tender. we sometimes suffer similar pains. we sometimes feel just as silly. its the melting shape from the quarter machine, the fading yellow candy that disappears on your tongue. you weed out the red hearts, the blue berries, you seek out the banana. let it dissolve into sweet syrup and run down your throat, like the kiss i give to you. when honey drips from between met lips the smile is that shape. when a tearing sound is heard in the room and the skin of it breaks, two hands let go and the noise is the same. its the tattoo she had on her hip and the one she showed you with a devilish smile before you wondered what life was for. it is the letters that make it love, the way it rolls off the tongue and floats away in a twist of fat letters, bumping into the ear and twisting its way in like happiness. B for better now. a for at last. n for never leaving. a for actually feeling life. n for now. a for admitting love is in the smallest detail of the yellow skin of a ripe banana.

about me

the whole world is a swirling blue film of slanted light and bent images. there is soft tinkling sound in the distance, the filter maybe. there is a quiet stiffness to the viscousness in my ears and eyes. my eyes are open and they are burning. above me two legs are floating in the blue sky, kicking like a newborns. Toes are clenching and unclenching, fists banging the surface. my hair is suspended around my face, long and blonde as it is. it creeps past my lips. my puffed cheeks. i blink slowly. i let my chest graze the cement bottom, my body hanging vertical above the floor. my bathing suit catches on the rough surface and makes me stick for a second. my legs are kicking softly, from the knees down. i am trying to stay just above the ground. i keep floating upward, little by little. im trying to be as still as possible. there is a loud crash behind me and i am surrounded by a million tiny bubbles that tickle my ankles and thighs. my lungs start to burn. i do not glance back to see who has come into the still moment i was having alone, at the bottom, away from the melted ice cream sandwiches, the screaming children, the menacing lifeguard. i keep floating under the blanket of blue, high on the peacefulness. when i close my eyes, the chlorine is stinging badly. i take both palms and plant them on the ground, shove myself toward the surface kicking hard and burst through sucking in air and taking deep breaths. i hear my name though i ignore it. i want to go back under but my ears are popping and ringing with the change in pressure, the release of the water. i push a strand of long, blonde, wet hair away from my forehead and just sink low enough in the water so my mouth is under. i swim carefully to the side of the pool and grasp the metal gutter the encircles the inner lip. feeling my way along the side with little toes on the wall, crab walking with my hands, i edge towards the deep end. mommy is standing there. she is holding out a towel like she wants to show me the design. i know she wants me to get in it though, get out of the water and step into her hug and i know she'll wrap me in that towel. it will be warm and soft and smell like the grass. shes talking to someone over her shoulder. its not really time to get out yet. if it were shed be looking right at me. shed have the look. the one she gets sometimes when im in big trouble. but for now shes distracted. i go back under. I can barely hear her call to me again as the sounds fade. i swim deeper. all of a sudden, theres tate. shes looking me in the face from just inches away with cheeks just as puffed as mine, holding in a little less air. shes swimming in that spastic way, twitching all over to try to stay under. somehow it is always just her bottom that floats to the surface and bobs there while the rest of her body is under water, reaching to keep her from surfacing. she has her eyes open as do i. she is just kicking. holding her breath. looking at me as she sways. she is smiling. the air comes from her mouth and nose in a burst of white bubbles as she laughs under water and has to surface before she swallows any. i watch as her tiny body swims upward, past mine. my eye level meets her chest, strained with effort, her pumping arms, her belly thats still rotund with baby fat, and her knees. finally, her toes wiggle past me as she makes it to the surface. when i am alone again, the silence envelops me. i feel fatigue creeping through my bones. six long hours of swimming. im nine. i love it. i settle into my favorite thought - what it will be like when i get a boyfriend. It is all i think about. i know one day ill put my fingers in his hair like nanny does to grandpa. i know he'll speak a language i dont know. maybe hell be from another planet- like le petite prince. he'll be just my height and have very dark eyes. he'll smell like summer and happiness and like this moment, in the pool, at the bottom of everything, watching people swim though the sky. when he holds my hand i'll know it fits like a lock and key and when he whispers to me in his language, ill let the words roll over me like waves on the sand - massage me, mold me, move me. his name will fit perfectly in every haiku, his ears will be soft and he'll smell like my mom. as the water creeps into my nose a little farther, and again i feel the burn from lack of air, i make myself stay under. the pain will help me find him sooner i tell myself.

mi nombre es olivia. no one but god gave me that name. when i died, my husband went to the back yard and sat staring at the sky for three days, praying for rain. it came too. i made sure of it. he said looking at the storming skies was like looking into my own eyes. he said my eyes were just as likely to kill him as lightning. he told me this on our wedding day. tus ojos me matan, he said. it was the second time we had met. we are from mexico. the two of us living under the confusion and the struggle that she can bring. she can be so kind, and so furious, she is a greater storm than my eyes could ever hope to be. my husband and i both worshipped her though, which is why we left her. not to die under the hands of whom was in power, but with promises of return, with kisses and gifts and of course, more promises. she did not let us go without a fight, a lasting impression meant to sting and to communicate we were never to leave her angry again. My three year old in my arms, i prayed to god that we never would. but those were the days in which i was strong, and happy. my body was still bursting with life and ready to bear two more children. my children of opportunity i called them. born in los estados unidos, they were the ones who wanted mexico the most. they were special to me in every way, but neither could be to me what my first born son was. like my name, god gave him his name as well. this i will not tell you yet, but i will confide that for my second and third children, god was silent, no longer demanding a name in his taciturn way. i named them myself and i could only pray that if god had stopped listening, then maybe he could find a small second to let me know i had chosen the correct ones. but he never sent a sign, though mi madre assured me that he was everywhere, all the time. so frustrated: i could get so frustrated when she said this. but that is something else.
Olivia comes from olives, as in the olive tree: a symbol of peace, dignity, and fruitfulness. when my mother was in labor with me, she was on a small cot, in the middle of a war. there were black curtains on the windows so no one would be able to see the candles lit inside, flickering shadows around the tiny room. she swore that for most of the labor she was delirious, not remembering anything later on and swearing she was in conference with He himself. just as her neighbor was preparing another vat of hot water with fresh towels, in preparation for catching me as i came gushing out in all my glory, she heard a tiny cry. coming quickly back into the room she saw my mother and me, clean and soft, folded among heaps of sweat drenched sheets, happily cooing to one another. the story goes that she almost fainted from disbelief, but more importantly she knew my name before it ever left my mother's lips. she says it was hanging in the air like a thick cloud of fog, scented with honey and rain. she whispered it as she sat on the ground by my mother's side and began to pray. at the same moment, the name was uttered from my mother's mouth, the last 'a' lingering for a second longer before it floated into the air like an irridescent bubble and bursted. and so, i was named simultaneously by the two women, but firstly by god.