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Mary Hastilow

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Frida, Her Parents and Grandparents

It’s so easy for a girl to fly balloons by the sea
Unhindered by the black and white that stiffen ancestry;
My grandparents and parents lead only down to me,
My trio of nipples and belly button point to an orange tree.

My mother, like her mother, poor, proud and preoccupied,
Is tied to the land by the weight wound in her womb.

My father, like his father who has clouds in his beard
And was Captain of the sea, has the eyes of humanity
He rules the house and from his lapel I see
The world.

Although I’m not yet dressed I have outgrown the garden
And beyond the walls I know my mothers unlit olive mountains
Where the cactus bursts its head spilling spores
And a wooden shed with sunflowers on the hillside waits for me
As I fly my balloons on red ribbons by the sea.

 

(from a picture by Frida Kahlo)

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