The Poet X

Aman asks Xiomara about church one day while they are walking to the train calling her by his nickname for her: “X” (132). She explains that her mother “is big into church / and I go with her and to confirmation classes” (133), but she is “into poetry” (133). When Aman asks her what her stage name is, she replies “maybe I’d be the Poet X” (133) and his expression of approval, “said by the right person / by a boy who raises [her] temperature” (134) makes her “[s]woon” (134).

Though Xavier knows Xiomara is “texting so late into the night that the glow / of my phone is the only light / in the whole apartment” (135), he doesn’t ask about it until Xiomara asks him if the reason he is smiling more has “a name” (137). The twins make a plan for Halloween; Xiomara later texts Caridad to invite her along.

The next time they meet after school, Aman asks Xiomara if she has “ever smoked a blunt” (140). She says no, and Aman “settles his hand on [her] thigh” (140).

The following Tuesday, “[t]he day that becomes THE DAY/ starts real regular” (142). Xiomara and Aman cut classes when a fire alarm rings with only 30 minutes left of school. At the park, they share Xiomara’s first kiss; she writes later that “my heart is one of Darwin’s finches learning to fly” (145). At her train stop, Aman asks her if she wants to go out this weekend, to Reuben’s Halloween party, but she doesn’t answer, distracted by “too many things to say and nothing to say at all” (147).

Xiomara goes to confirmation class feeling sure that “[a]nyone who looks at me / will know I know what it means to want” (149). She thinks of all the things she wants to do but can’t, remembering that “Mami told me I’d have to pray extra / so my body didn’t get me in trouble” (151). When she was younger, Xiomara hid her body “in big sweaters… / trying to turn this body into an invisible equation” (151) but now, she wants Aman “to leave his fingerprints all over me. To show all his work” (151). Noticing Xiomara’s distracted state of mind, Father Sean talks with Xiomara about self-doubt, admitting his own experience with self-doubt to reassure Xiomara and to encourage her to speak openly about what she is thinking.

At home, Xiomara and Xavier talk while Xavier texts rapidly on his phone. When Xiomara asks him about his texting, he says, “‘we both know we’re messing around / and that Mami and Papi will kill us if they find out’” (155). Xiomara writes about the fact that their parents’ expectations are different for each of them when it comes to dating and that they probably wouldn’t mind if Xavier had a girlfriend; however, “I don’t know what they would do / if the person he brought home was not a girl” (155).

Xavier comes home from school with a black eye, and Mami assumes that Xiomara is responsible for his injury. Xiomara is “heated / with Twin / for not telling me / someone at school / was bothering him” (160). She texts with Caridad, asking her if she can skip the weekend movie plan they made for Halloween so she can go to the party instead. Caridad agrees to help Xiomara, but warns her not to “get pregnant” (162). The night of the party, Xiomara leaves with Xavier, but then leaves him to take the train to Washington Heights, where Reuben lives. She waits for Aman and “ignore[s] the stares of a group of boys by the speakers” (164). When Aman arrives, they dance “exactly the way people do / in music videos” (166). Xiomara gets nervous and needs to take a break from dancing, so they go outside; Aman says that he lives nearby and that his father is at work. Xiomara feels shaky, and she gets up to go, but Aman “pulls [her] back down beside him” (168), asking her to read him a poem. On her way home, Xiomara texts Caridad to let her know she is on her way, telling Caridad that she has “a lot of feelings. But it was fine” (170).

On Monday after school, Xiomara takes a train downtown to Xavier’s school to find out more about her brother’s black eye. She sees Xavier with “a tall, red-haired boy, with fingers the color of milk” (173) who acts tenderly towards her brother. Xavier spots his twin sister and demands to know why she is at his school, telling her “‘I don’t need you to fight for me anymore’” (174). As they take the train home together, Xiomara wants to discuss “White Boy” (176), but Xavier only wants to play chess on his phone.

In a draft for an assignment for English class about a person misunderstood by society, Xiomara writes about Mami, who was her “hero” until Xiomara hit puberty and Mami’s behavior towards Xiomara changed. She turns in an essay about Nicki Minaj instead, reluctant to confess her true feelings to her teacher. In English class, a member of the poetry club named Chris performs a short piece and tells the class about the citywide slam in February. Xiomara feels herself react: “I should be there. / I should compete” (183).

Aman and Xiomara go ice-skating on a day when school is off and Mami is at work, triggering in Xiomara the memory of an old birthday tradition: when they were younger, Mami would take the twins ice-skating for their birthday every year. Xiomara learns that Aman loves winter sports, so much so that he “made Pops pay / for a special TV channel so [he] could keep up” (186). When he was a little boy in Trinidad, he watched the Winter Olympics, and he tells Xiomara that he is “nice with the skates” (186). Xiomara invites Xavier to come with them, but he is still mad at her, so she goes to meet Aman alone. Aman amazes Xiomara with his confidence and his “turns and figure eights” (188), and Xiomara marvels at “all the things we could be / if we were never told our bodies were not built for them” (188).

On the train heading home after skating, Aman kisses Xiomara, and they embrace even though it’s “too easy to run into someone from the block” and “people are probably staring” (189). As she walks home from the train station, Xiomara thinks about the addictive quality of her time with Aman, comparing herself to a junkie with “eyes wide with hunger” (191). When she arrives home, Xiomara hears Mami yelling and realizes that Mami witnessed her “make-out session on the train” (192) so she goes straight to her bedroom. Xavier comes in and finds her, but Xiomara is in such trouble that she “can’t even be grateful / he’s speaking to [her] again” (193).

While Mami and Papi yell at each other about Xiomara’s behavior, she tries to “unhear / my mother turn my kissing ugly, / my father call me the names / all the kids have called me / since I grew breasts” (194). Xavier tries to help, but Xiomara refuses it, saying “I didn’t do anything wrong” (197) as they hear the footsteps of their parents stop outside their bedroom door. When the confrontation between Xiomara and her parents begins, Mami drags Xiomara to her altar of the Virgin and demands that Xiomara pray to the Virgin Mary for forgiveness while kneeling on uncooked grains of rice. Xiomara compares herself to an ant that “will / survive / the / apocalypse” (201). As Mami yells at her and calls her a cuero, “[t]he Dominican word for ho” (205), Xiomara silently accepts her accusation, thinking to herself, “I am a cuero, and they’re right. / I hope they’re right. I am. I am. I AM” (205). Mami continues to yell, describing all men as dirty and reminding Xiomara that “Eve was easily tempted” (208). Mami hits Xiomara in the face over and over, making her feel dizzy and sick, and then “prays and prays” (209) while Xiomara writes poetry in her head “[t]hat has nothing to do with repentance” (210).  

Afterwards, Xavier tries to comfort Xiomara with “a bag / of frozen mixed vegetables” on her knees and her cheek, telling her “don’t get in trouble / until we can leave. / Soon we can leave for college” (213). Xavier tells Caridad what’s happened, and they both show concern for Xiomara, but she wants to do nothing but “curl into a ball and weep” (215). Mami punishes Xiomara by taking away all of her freedoms, including her phone, but she doesn’t know what she would say to Aman even if she could text him or call him.

The next day at school, Xiomara stands next to her locker in a fog, still overwhelmed by the events of the previous day. She doesn’t notice a group of boys behind her until “one bumps me / both his hands palming and squeezing my ass” (218) in front of other students, including Aman. Xiomara pauses as “[e]verything inside [her] feels beaten” (218) and she hopes for a moment that Aman will stand up for her. To her disappointment, frustration, and, eventually, anger, Xiomara realizes that Aman is “not going to do a damn thing” (219). She shoves the guy whose hands were on her body and threatens him. As she walks away, she says to Aman, “‘That goes for you too. Thanks for nothing’” (220).