Distance

I was being introduced to a stranger that has the same blood but in a different country.

I remember mom telling me to hug you,

But being 6, I was timid and yet confident enough to squeeze you

At first, I didn’t know what a brother was until I met you.

I glanced and saw your dark green eyes and I asked myself how could we be from the same plant.

"El es tu hermanito"

Seeing our roots grow so differently, we were forced to learn from each other.

After a squeeze of confusion, I became attached to you like a bee surrounding a rose. I felt the need to fly around you for 20 days.

I saw our differences from gallo pinto to pizza, palo de mayo to a thousand miles away and made me question why we were so far away from connecting.

I remember asking you to get in a piece of luggage to come home with me.

“Adios hermanito”

Looking out of the airplane window guessing where my other home was at.

I cried wishing you were in that luggage to have you next to me.

Every year I asked mom...

“Cuando viene Engell”

I was lied to each summer the older we got the plants would die and the desperate wait became useless You turned 19 and you came to me.

Laughs, hugs, fights…something we never shared in our childhood

The wait was worth it

Those laughs hugs fights became so unreal... a year wasn’t enough to recover our whole childhood

The distance separated us again

You craved to be more independent and you left me with my arms wide open.

You’re starting a new world for yourself a new life

You found a rose that will keep you company

even when I still wanted to keep laughing, hugging, and fighting.

As close a bee and a rose are, we are still very different

Distance made us say goodbye.