I Am, and I Will Be

"Comete todos tus vegetales," my mother would tell me

As I sat, after school, at our small dinner table

in our small dining room

In our small, two bedroom, one bathroom house.

"Si no te los comes, no vas a llegar aser grande," my mother would remind me

As I stared at a verdant plate that mocked

the absense of verdant paper in 

A brown leather wallet.

"Quiero que seas un abogado," my mother would encourage me

As I watched her punch numbers in a square machine

that yelled for more,

The more we did not have.

"Un dia, bebe, un dia no vas a sufrir lo que yo sufri," my mother would cry

As I watched clear tears slip from her eyelids

and land on piles of envelopes.

Envelopes, envelopes.

I am from immigrants.

I am an immigrant.

I am the fruit of my parents' labor.

And I will be someone bigger, someone greater.

I will take from my parents the suffering they have endured

and cure they're wounds with my success because

I am an immigrant, and I know what its like

to hurt.