Carmelita’s Here

and the wrong-tasting words
do not roll from her tongue,
perhaps, because English

is, for her, an acquired taste,
used only to bring food to the table.
There, she sits to offer her praise—

still, with her native words,
repeating the rosary daily—
like she did in her native land.

When God answers,
pouring out His abundance on the
northern side of the Rio Grande,

where—like everywhere—
bread alone will not quell
the nagging pangs of her living hunger,

she will know she is an alien,
a sojourner in this world,
here and on the poorer side of river.



First published in The Eintouist





© Helen Losse http://helenl.wordpress.com/