“Gay? Means happy no?”
You telling me you love a man?”
“No, hijo, you confused in your head,
maybe too much sun maybe too much rum.
You are Puerto Rican. Gay is a white problem.
You are Puerto Rican, hijo, with big cojones.”
“I bring you to this country too young. You get confused.
Forgot where you coming from.”
“Leave my house. Before your father kills you.
Better dead than gay he will say. Go!”
“I wish I could bury those words not bury you.
I hope he…your amor held you close in your last moments, hijo de mi vida.”
Mohini Malhotra was born in New York, grew up in Nepal, Thailand, India, Italy, and lives in Washington D.C.. She runs a social enterprise (artbywomen.gallery) to promote contemporary women artists from emerging markets and invests profits to better women’s and girls’ lives. She loves words, she loves language and has her fiction published in Blink-Ink, Flash Frontier, Star 82 Review, and other wonderful journals.
A Quiet Courage 