Chicana Mermaid With Drunk White Men

after neruda,sorta,casi

The white men were drunk
when a Chicana mermaid walked into the bar,
the white men spit on her

because she was brown.
She should not have left the river,
they spit on her.

They insulted her brown skin,
but they longed for her brown breasts in secret,
they burned her with their cigarettes,

they rolled on the floor laughing,
she couldn’t talk,
her eyes were the color of cinnamon.

She left by the same door she came in,
she plunged deep into the water of the barrio
until the barrio encircled the white men’s throats.