First, begin with the glottal stop. I learn  
it is more of a letter than a punctuation.         Hide 
your tongue /monoongen/                   let the air escape 
                                              your mouth / motoongen/ A push— 
of muscle. A catch in your                  throat/ mongoong /

‘Eyooshiraaw’nga/ In our language / it’s hard to hide 
the self–your relations.  Body  
parts require prefixes.             The Tongva language  
asks, who does this tongue belong to? Whose 
mouth speaks?  

The definition comes easily because 
 ‘Wiishmenok sounds like       wish,                a cousin to want  
 or like that could lead to                                desire or love.  

Wiishmenokre / I love you. / One word equals 
a sentence.                 The “re” is both the I  
and the you; the lover and the loved  
in two letters, side by side.                 But context matters.

Wiishemokre / I want you / I desire you— 
What could your lover mean?            What could they hide 
in this language?        Nay’ wiishemokne  
neshiiro’a / But I love my language. / I can become 
a translation of my own desire. 

Wiishemokne menee’ / I love this—
that this word can be smushedagainst  
others. Say to your lover:                   Shiraaw’shmenokne / I want to talk.  
Add the shiraaw/ talk / in front of the shmenok/ want. / End it with the /ne/ I.  
Let your tone do the rest. 

We could smush more words together. 
Háwtok / Perhaps / at the end  
of the night, you might say:                Miishmenokne / I want to go—
Or: chwiishkeshmenokre / I want to kiss you. 
End your night with all your wants. The lesson is done.

in a home with no books in spanish or english, papi’s tongue lashes the air 
    mami’s murmurs float & pop like burbujitas   
en español, they swallow their “esses,” leave syllables dangling pa’ ná’
    their rush to speak making words rise like mami’s incense 
        rising & slipping up through the kitchen fan
the rounded countertop radio out of my reach hurls spanish bolts of words
    too quick for me to catch and color with crayons I hide 
        from little brothers who stuff anything into their mouths
at five, i see & listen to sesame street, sound out slowly the muppets’ english
    with no “esses,” no broken words, letters slow enough
        for me to trace on the TV’s fat bubble screen
*
in preschool with no books in spanish, i learn my abc’s with no “esses,” no 
    broken words, no spanish rs for my first or last names
my american preschool teacher holds my right fist around crayon, shapes
    my first letters only in english, makes me mimic her voice 
        only in english, the only language that counts
            for me to survive