I learned all about you
from a set of Portuguese
language cassettes borrowed
from the public library twenty
years ago. You were a bad
boy sweet talker, a whisperer
of secrets and irresistible
lies. Everyone in every lesson
told you no.  Não, João!  I
was made to repeat over
and again when you pleaded
for money, promising to repay
me next Monday. And when
your motorcycle was in the shop
and you needed to borrow
my car. Your eyes would have
been devilish and deep, long-
lashed and quietly laughing
all the time, eyes that follow
a person and then, when met,
appear bored, bemused.
You were a magnet of a man
and I was forewarned,
rehearsing the only reply:  Não,
João. João, não!  But now—
traipsing your city all these years
later, while my own country flirts
with strong men, and the dangerous
little boys who look up to them—
you refuse to turn up. Oh, João,
where is your harried plea
for a night on my posada floor
as friends and nothing more?
I suppose I’m too late, traveling
with my teenage daughter?
Old enough to know better, I
could finally be your mother,
if, like much else here, João,
you’ve stayed the same. Or
was that you in the elevator
of my hotel, a busboy with lips
like a ripe question, and a pale
kitchen net hiding your crown
of dark curls? Now that I can
recognize in you the restless
undefeated soul so like my
father once, or my sons soon,
did you arrive only to ask nothing,
holding parted the door after
pushing an empty room-service
cart into the hall? You called me
Senhora. Dipped your head
as I passed. Wait, João. Every
version of me wants to know:
Does this world still insist
on telling you no?