This is another house
we are passing through
where shadows and mother’s
furtive tears hang on walls
that echo with my sister’s
constant cough.

I inhale the scent
of lemon and vanilla
from the thick black plaits
of the Nahuatl woman
singing in mother’s
hand-me-down dress.

Across the street, the elders
await their journey
of cypresses and marigolds
to la Tierra de los Muertos
and the cemetery that looms
behind their living room.

But on Sunday afternoons
there’s a bullfight on TV
and childhood’s mouse
scuttles in the darkness
playing with the blue haze
of father’s Havana.

The urn was a white ball of salt.
I was surprised by its weight.

We were advised to wait until dusk
to honour mother’s wishes.

I cradled it as we walked
to the end of the harbour,

along the promenade where
we used to stroll with her,

under the mauve mountains
and the flaming sunsets she loved

because they reminded her of Mexico.
In my hands, it glowed like a strange moon,

flickering with the on and off red flashes
of beacon lights that guide ships to safety.

I had to dig my nails in to prise the lid off,
but it was too dark to see inside.

Then my brother took the sphere
and held it tightly while balancing

on the seawall’s jagged slabs,
jutting at dangerous angles after storms.

He lowered it into the water,
where it floated until we heard a bubbling

and we were left watching the reflections
of the harbour’s lights on the waves.

We did as she’d asked, left her unburied, held by the sea of my father’s country.