Los saguaros are being destroyed
The sun is needed and also dangerous
Beneath it people hide things for others
en la sombra de saguaros
Water in containers painted black
to absorb not reflect sun
Sunscreen Sombreros
Clothes Crude maps
Imagine the sun betraying your whereabouts
Not using a phone for fear
of becoming a little black
dot crossing a line
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Oh sí, your location is being commodified
Along with cages and the cages around them
A virus travels like the rich
Saguaros can die of frost
spreading over expandable skin and fruit red as royalty
Wooden ribs can hold two hundred gallons of rain
Si se dejan al sol y la lluvia saguaros can live two centuries
As long as this country has been
Longer than this f r o n t e r a has been
To kill or steal a saguaro is a felony
Cactus cops normalmente roam the border
now stand by while saguaros are removed
to make room for a wall whose removal
will be reminiscent of Berlin
Después de cien años a saguaro starts to grow its first arm
lifting it into the sky as if to say
Dame tus cansados tus pobres your huddled masses
yearning to breathe libres Envíame los desposeidos
I lift my lámpara beside the sun-colored door
You can’t really drink out of a cactus
Even though Hollywood says nothing holds fresh water
like the plant that protects itself
Mis tíos drank beer out of cans
and asked us to bring them one after another
We were like the ‘h’ en español
Silent A placeholder
Some of us swore we’d never grow up and marry tipos así
Some of us swore no casarnos
to be rara like the ~ or el ʹ in text messages
Would Hollywood have us laughing as we flashed forward
to my prima’s husband snapping móle-covered fingers at her
demanding: traeme otra tortilla
Would it show her telling him: get on up—y traeme una chela
with música swelling in the background
Maybe it would show my familia looking at her
as if she slapped him
as if she tried to drink water out of a cactus
Los del desierto know that unless it’s a special barrel cactus
the green goo inside sickens you
maybe even dehydrates you to death
Hollywood knows that insulting your marido
might get you una cachetada
Y no hay laugh-track at the border
You’re not always sola
But you’re on one side or the other
Un ʹ isn’t todo lo opuesto of an ‘h’ en español
which bolsters the letter next to it
Ser soltera isn’t the opposite of being married
Who thought to bring the cactus inside to be a houseplant
Marcy Rae Henry is a multidisciplinary Xicana artist from the Borderlands who loves succulents, purple tulips, and red roses. She is the author of death is a mariachi (Bauhan Press), winner of the May Sarton NH Poetry Prize, when to go to the Taj Mahal (Bottlecap Press), the body is where it all begins (Querencia Press), dream life of night owls (Open Country Press), winner of the Open Country Chapbook Contest, and We Are Primary Colors (DoubleCross Press). Her work has received a Chicago Community Arts Assistance Grant, an Illinois Arts Council Fellowship, three Pushcart nominations, and first prize in Suburbia’s Novel Excerpt Contest. M. Rae is a professor of English, literature and creative writing at Wright College Chicago, a Hispanic Serving Institution, and an associate editor for RHINO. She is a digital minimalist with no social media accounts. marcyraehenry.com