Barrio Secrets

Only abuela knew my secrets
the open casket

it is still us
like fallen leaves in the barrio

my guilty face
on each of those brown leaves

my school-girl sister
in the gray jeep of the sky

my brothers
log-jammed on an LA freeway

my indio father
pasted against the mountains

I push hard on the boulder
to get it off my tongue

my toothless abuela sits in the house
like a lump of coal

my hair crowns the barrio
with its shaft of light

and any moment now
time could begin