Let Me Thank Taíno Ancestors and Say They Were Right
by Jerilynn Aquino
—everything living came from caves, which makes sense when you separate what you think you know. Let your knowledge start from scratch. Let your knowledge learn the ground beneath its feet, discover a void within the bedrock. Your knowledge didn’t see its own beginning, but last week saw a bloody root fall from a similar mouth. The sun turns around, your knowledge grows: Openings produce bodies, and so do those bodies.
You see how it makes sense, everything living, coming from caves. My knowledge didn’t get to keep its beginning, but I was born a week late. I was told doctors had to grip me and pull. I believe it, because when I turn around I see a void. And when my knowledge arrived, the first thing it saw was a suitcase. Really, I have everything I need: knowing how I came from a cave, how my beginning had something to do with ending.