Diasporican Interview from the Moon

¿Eres borincano aunque nacieras en la luna?

From this far away, I can’t even see

Puerto Rico, swallowed by the blue

of the ocean. From this far away,

the word volver loses all meaning.

The word patria becomes an empty echo

floating out into space. Can you claim

to know a homeland only from dreams?

It’s impossible to pick out

una sola estrella from the countless

that populate this endless sky.

to pretend you remember any landscape

other than these seas of gray. I rename

the maria after all the heroes I know—

Albizu, Fernández, Filiberto, Lolita.

I fry chuletas in a moon crater pan,

smash my plátanos in a moon crater

pilón. They don’t taste the same here,

but, coño, haven’t we always made do?

Haven’t we always adapted, decided

being Puerto Rican was whatever we needed?

Maybe I don’t need to be borincano.

Maybe being Lunarican is enough for me.

The other day I walked around loosing

every American flag I could find. And if

a moon rover finds me?—¡que se joda!

You can’t tell me there’s anything

more Puerto Rican than that, letting American

flags fly off like plastic bags in the wind,

tumbling off without a land to claim,

letting them float so far away, you can’t see them.