Lorena
On the long daily drive all the way
from East L.A. to Lancaster, I glance up
at new billboards
that speak to me
in Spanish:
AMERICANOS TODOS.
LUCHAMOS POR LA VICTORIA.
ESTA GUERRA ES SUYA.
AMERICANS ALL.
WE FIGHT FOR VICTORY.
THIS WAR IS YOURS.
The Office of War Information
and the Office of the Coordinator
of Inter-American Affairs
have decided to invite
people like me
to apply for jobs
in aircraft factories. . . .
So I could actually be
a little bit closer to my new dream
of learning to be a pilot
in a world where men
can’t imagine
women
in flight.
The airplane factories want us.
They need workers, and they don’t care
if we speak Spanish on the job. . . .
It’s blasted over la radio every day, an invitation
to make more money than any cannery,
packing plant,
or farm
could ever offer,
by working like Rosie the Riveter
in that famous song, fusing metal to metal
with equipment that women never used
before this war
that has taken
all the men
far away.
Winged Dreams
Marisela
Is it TRUE,
that promise
on those
billboards?
Could my sister really BUILD
shiny, birdlike machines that will RISE up
toward the stars like magic,
WINNING
and
ENDING
this on-and-on series of battles?
While Lorena applies for a man’s job,
I keep singing at union meetings,
but in between spells of real life,
I fly back toward daydreams
of dancing and LOVE.
When, ay, cuándo, will Manolito
return?
The Interview
Lorena
Men, women, a series of people
all asking such difficult questions.
Yes, I’m a citizen, hard worker, fluent reader.
I can follow directions in English, I do understand
that even tiny mistakes will cost lives
if airplanes
are made wrong,
so that they tumble down, down,
down from blue sky.
A beauty contest at the aircraft factory?
I say yes, yes, right in the middle of the most
confusing part of the interview, without
understanding that it’s part of an official plan
for the city of Los Angeles to forget the riots.
If mexicanas are included in beauty, they explain,
then clearly everything is fair and equal,
even the past.
No School
Ray
Bored.
Battered with chores.
Nothing to do but work all day in the garden
for my grandma, who even makes me do laundry,
ironing, mending.
Girls’ work.
Embarrassing.
Abuela tells me I should be ashamed,
avergonzado, for getting expelled
from una escuela that could have made ME
the first in our family to graduate
with the sort of education
old folks call
preparación.
Preparation—for what?
Does she really believe that I
could ever go to college
and get a good job?
Four-Four
Ray
After Abuela begs him, a shop teacher
talks the principal into bringing me back
to school
on the four-four plan, half a day
in classes, the other half
making bombs
for the war effort.
Industrial arts suddenly changes
from woodworking, welding, and auto repair
to mixing up chemicals, explosives,
DANGER.
But this four-four work-study program
seems like my ONLY chance to graduate
and make Papá orgulloso/proud
when he finishes
fighting.
My First Real Job
Ray
The four-four money comes in handy
for my family, but it means I have to spend
half of each day touching powders
designed
for death.
So I end up looking up at the SKY
after work, seeing—or IMAGINING—
the ghost
or angel
of José Díaz.
Sombra, fantasma, espíritu, espanto, muerto,
all the words I know for naming a dead guy
make me feel like I’m not quite completely
alive
yet.
Studying
Ray
It’s not so bad.
Most of the words in my new English class
make sense.
Certain poems have a bold RHYTHM.
Others just quietly sing
and sway.
Math moves around in my mind too,
rows of numbers describing themselves
as one-at-a-time,
eventually mastered
tasks.
Solve this problem.
Carry the remainder.
Show every step.
Yes, it takes practice.
No, I don’t have to make anything
look
easy.
GIRLS!
Ray
After school, after work,
girls ask me to dance in every contest,
even the HUGE competitions
in ENORMOUS sports stadiums.
Pachuco hop, that’s what I dance best,
just casual and COOL while the girl glides
and spins all around me.
It’s a style with its own NAME now, like breakaway
or swing out.
Pachuco hop—my privately, personally,
very-much-alive invented world.
I toss my partner up in the air, catch her,
and bring her back down from outer space
to Earth, so that together we almost always
WIN!
The Spirit of Ray
Ray
When peeled people
move into our own
swirls
and twirls
of meaning
we no longer
see ourselves
as ghostly.
I’m
ALIVE!
¡Viva la vida!
Sharing
Marisela
WHISPERING to other women
at work, I describe the fair treatment
we deserve—safe conditions,
reasonable hours, the same pay as men . . .
but at home, I’m not a union organizer,
just a helper for Abuela, kneading masa
to make tamales, so we can sell them
on Saturday mornings at church
to raise money for charities
that feed hungry refugees
overseas, in the horror
of Europe’s
war zones.
When skinny children
from our own neighborhood
beg for scraps of broken tamales,
I hand them over, glad to be HELPING
in two places
at the same time!
Mariachi music.
I dan
ce a polka, imagining Manolito
back in Cuba, all the letters I receive
filled with descriptions
of his own island’s efforts
to keep Nazi submarines
from reaching
the U.S.
Portions of each sheet of paper
are blacked out by the pen
of a military censor.
He’s joined Cuba’s navy,
helping to escort American warships
across dangerous waters.
When I send careful answers
on perfumed paper, I have no way
of knowing whether the wild feelings
behind my cautious words
will be allowed
to travel.
El Día de los Muertos
Lorena
The Day of the Dead.
A reunion with family spirits right after—
but so different from—Halloween, a holiday of ghosts.
Marisela has union pamphlets at work
and Manolito’s love letters at home,
but all I receive are these black-edged
death envelopes
that were handed out
at church.
Mami assigns me the task
of writing ancestral names—los abuelos
who lived long ago in México.
Ray tells me to add one more
black mourning note
for the spirit of José Díaz,
victim of murder.
So much time has passed
since I thought
about the violence at Sleepy Lagoon
that I feel like I’m dreaming
of a future, not the past.
Just one death?
What a relief that would be now,
while war news grows every day,
more and more gold stars
on our neighbors’
tragic windows.
With respect for my little brother’s request,
I scribble the name of José, a stranger.
Fragrant incense at church,
mysterious Latin words
as the priest chants on and on,
until finally he places
the comfort
of a Communion wafer
on my peace-hungry tongue.
Then pan del cielo. Bread of heaven.
On el Día de los Muertos, I’ve always loved
swallowing tiny bites of mercy
for all the saints,
las ánimas, the spirits,
los angelitos,
little angels. . . .
Abuela says los difuntos fieles, the loyal dead,
will be grateful for all the toys, food, and flowers
that we carry to the cemetery for our picnic
with the ancestors,
but this year I’m not
doing it just for spirits,
it’s also for the living,
Nicolás
and Papá. . . .
Relief
Abuela
Sometimes happiness is just
the momentary absence
of sadness.
No graves with the names of descendants,
just los antepasados
my ancestors.
Our celebration at the graveyard
is lively as we greet invisible
loved ones
from long ago,
sharing sugar skulls
and flowers of death,
the orange and yellow flores
called marigolds.
Do Memories Ever Leave Us Completely Alone?
Ray
Abuela tells me
that owls
and spirits
are invisible
in darkness,
mysterious
at dawn,
timid
in sunlight,
fearless
by twilight,
and happy at our picnic . . .
but she can’t answer
any of my questions
about the future
of José Díaz
or the past
of my own
feelings.
A Free Country
Ray
As soon as our celebration with los muertos
is over, my thoughts turn from family spirits
to movement.
The Los Angeles City Council
might be able to forbid zoot suits,
but they can’t outlaw DANCING,
can they?
After school, during work, while wondering
about questions no one can answer, I make up
my mind
to LEAP
as high as I can,
maybe even learn other steps someday—there’s
a man named José Limón, who people say
makes modern dance look muscular and masculine
because he leaps so high that he seems to
FLY, ballet style, not zooter. . . .
Interviews
Marisela
Hat, suit, tie, notebook, pen,
camera . . .
At first glance, I assume
that the STRANGER at our door
is someone from work, a boss or checker
here to FIRE ME, but he turns out to be
a reporter, calling us una familia
de la victoria,
even though he can’t
pronounce a single
Spanish syllable
correctly.
At least he’s trying.
A VICTORY FAMILY, he explains,
describing his series of news articles
about people who contribute toward
the war effort
in so many quiet ways,
not just by fighting,
but by growing food in our garden,
donating blood to the Red Cross,
and working at jobs that support
the military.
It’s confusing for me
to think of my cannery labor
as strategic, but it’s true; the food
we send overseas is just as IMPORTANT
as Ray’s
explosives.
if he knew that I’m secretly a union
organizer, determined to make LIFELONG
policies, not just temporary publicity
during these war years?
I imagine he wants only stories
about girls who OBEY
men’s rules.
Beauty Contest
Lorena
I don’t want to answer the reporter’s
nosy questions about how it feels
to be a runner-up in the
Riveting Rosie Victory Competition.
I entered that tricky beauty pageant
because Mexican and Filipino girls
were encouraged to try, even though
our darker friends from Mississippi
and Alabama were falsely advised
that the competition
was already
full.
As it turns out, I’m just barely light enough
to be a Riveting Rosie princess, but never
the queen of an aircraft manufacturer’s
shiny calendar.
By the time November
is pinned up on every wall
of the entire enormous factory,
my brown face has already
been spread all over Los Angeles
on billboards that announce
in many languages:
NOW HIRING!
Esta guerra es suya
Mami
This war is yours.
The nervous reporter
quotes a slick billboard.
No me importa.
I don’t care.
No war is mine.
Women don’t start wars.
All I want is my hus
band
and my son
home
alive.
¡Viva la victoria!
Long live victory!
Yes, he can photograph
my enthusiastic smile
when he repeats
his newspaper’s
hopeful slogan.
Every Story Needs an Angle
Reporter #1
We’re under orders
to make this city
seem unified.
Reporter #2
The riots made my reputation.
Now I owe it to this city to dig up
all these Spanish-talking war heroes
that the officials say we need
in order to keep
the peace
here at home.
Reporter #3
That older brother
is the real story.
MISSING IN ACTION!
The most powerful
headline
for my riveting new
Victory Family
AMALGAMATION
angle.
Amalgamation
Ray
The Victory Familia news story
comes out all mixed up
and full of nonsense
about how to fuse
different cultures
“without resorting
to intermarriage.”
As soon as I have a chance,
I duck into the school library
to look up amalgamation
in a dictionary.
It means uniting one metal with another,
merging them into a single substance,
creating an alloy of poisonous mercury
with gold, silver, etc.
So what I want to know is, do newsmen
imagine that WE are the poison
or the gold?
Reality
Lorena
I keep certain aspects of my defense job
private.
That first day working inside the cockpit of a plane
I cried.
The noise of my rivet gun sounded
like danger.
Now I’ve gotten used to the size and noise
of the factory.
We’re as big as a city,
one hundred thousand employees
rushing around
inside giant
windowless
buildings,
the whole thing
covered up
with camouflage nets
that are decorated
with fake canvas houses,
with brown-and-green wire trees
and painted streets to make it look—from above—