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Esteban Rodríguez

__________

Throw Down

With rumors in every room,
you learn who wants to throw down
with who, that tomorrow,
or the next day or the next,
you will face an enemy you didn’t know
you had. And so, you go home,
raid your mother’s jewelry box,
put on every ring she owns,
and in your room, after you convince
yourself how angry you should feel,
you begin punching the wall,
over, over, and over again,
until the bleeding starts,
and your knuckles become numb,
and you imagine this is the way
your father feels, not just fatigued
when he comes home from work,
but defeated, less of himself,
ready to take out what he bottled
all day on the nearest wall,
or on a lamp, a chair, or on a cheek
that sometimes happens to be yours,
or that sometimes, when you’re
at a distance watching him,
is your mother’s. And you imagine,
knowing that you shouldn’t,
that if you’re as successful
as your father is, your opponent
will limp to the corner, and after
the crying stops, and silence swells
his throat, he will look at you,
like your mother looks at your father,
and accept that when two bodies
are thrust together, one is bound to lose.

__________

Heist

Neighborhoods later,
and my cousin finds one
he likes, a black lab, older
than a puppy, but still young
enough to sell. And so,
because the house has no fence,
and the dog is chained in the corner
of the yard, we step out of Lalo’s
car, confident that with night
as our accomplice, we can feed it
the leftovers we brought,
and that once we sweet talk
our way closer, and the lab
lets down the last of its guard,
it will come away with us,
and for the next few days,
while Lalo negotiates the price,
I will help care for it, forget
that it was ever stolen,
that there is some boy or girl—
no older than I am—who
is putting up signs, who
is going door to door asking
if they’ve seen their Shadow,
Max, the birthday gift they proved
all year they could be responsible for.
And when it’s sold, and Lalo
pockets all the profit, you know
you won’t question his actions,
or if he deserves it, or if you
should feel guilty for your role
in this, because who but you
is going to care, who but you
will have the best memories
to share?

__________

Bury

The club but not the gloves,
bag, not the balls he picked up,
gazed at like a new specimen.
No, your father bought nothing else
at the garage sale that day,
and at home, with the club in his hand,
he stood in the middle of the yard,
swung at nothing again and again,
until something within him said
he should hit every empty beer can,
and after sending them into the driveway
or street, he should swing at what
had long be ignored: rusted nails,
chunks of wood, small car parts
your father had tossed, saying,
if only to himself, that he was going
to use them someday, only that day
never came, and instead this one
found him swinging, so suddenly,
harder, harder, hoisting the club
over his head, and with all his strength,
smashing the ground till he made a hole,
one, you believed, where he could bury
if not his anger, then at least his regret—
every thing he could have done, every
version of himself he could have been.

__________

Esteban Rodríguez is the author of the poetry collections Dusk & Dust, Crash Course, In Bloom, (Dis)placement, and The Valley. His work has appeared in Boulevard, Shenandoah, The Rumpus, TriQuarterly, and elsewhere. He is the Interviews Editor for the EcoTheo Review, an Assistant Poetry Editor for AGNI, and a regular reviews contributor for [PANK] and Heavy Feather Review. He lives with his family in Austin, Texas. You can find him on Twitter @estebanjrod11.

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