Ode to My Fat Self

lines written in Barcelona after a gay white man mocked me

C. Adán Cabrera

source: Arrested Movement

he taps his lover’s bare shoulder       snorts
points to the lonely bench                  where i’m reading
under the embers       of the evening sun

in the thin air              his waxen hands trace           
an inflated double chin
 two upturned bouncing palms          a belly, imagined 

three words   
        buddha                gut                   luck
                          hang in the twilight-colored breeze
and in case I didn’t get it
his green eyes dare me to stare back

this alien city               spreads out before us
shards of stained glass            and unstained steel
glisten             on their way        to the violent sea

i’m an ocean      and a continent        away from my first home
from my other            forgotten         self
pushed past    the event horizon       of oblivion

(and yet           i’m back in third grade

eddie lua         rattling my temples    with two fists             in the cafeteria
twisting my nipples     with the same shape     and force     as hatred
tilling my skin              with laughter              and lilac
too shameful to explain          or expose        to mamá

or                     

swimming       in a black cotton shirt
            my teenage body hidden        from the sun     and their smiles
     so serrated             with scorn
when every wednesday          the teacher assigns me a team
because she knows     that being chosen last
is the same                  as not being picked at all

or

every time i said          no gracias        i’m full
because no one           will love you that way            
they said         no one loves a fat guy
so because i wanted          a man to love me        I fasted         in sacrifice)  

i want to tell this white man—
whose ancestors wandered               wherever        they pleased
perhaps here in barcelona      or san salvador   or plague-ridden london
explored even the moon itself         so pale so smug        in the half-lit sky

this person who now feels free          to deride my body
deform it         with airy gestures
into what he deems    to be        my shameless            obesity
question perhaps     the breath that fills my lungs    the worth of the iron in my blood

i want to tell him         and his boyfriend         or sometime lover          
        while i smolder him       with my gaze       that they’re a long way from kansas

and that a panza like mine     only swells large and proud
when you share pupusas        or pizza            or mint-murky mojitos
or split an encouraging word           or the weight of loss        with those you love

that this mounded chest            brings wordless pleasure
toes and willpower curl      defeated     in its flame

and that all of me     barely fits       in the clothes i chose
because           you basic       bony                bro
           loving yourself        ain’t easy to contain     when it bursts      at the seams

but don’t waste words           abuelita would say
a burro will never    speak spanish
no matter how loud    you scream at it

so please         i say to him instead        rub my belly              for luck:
you’ll need it      to survive        after I kick       
your pasty ass
                                 down
                                                this fat
                                                                 brown
                                                                                     hill

C. Adán Cabrera is the son of Salvadoran refugees. A 2011 Lambda Literary Fellow, he holds an MFA from the University of San Francisco and a bachelor’s degree from UCLA. Originally from Los Angeles, Carlos currently lives and works in Barcelona and is working on his second collection of short stories. @cadancabrera