indoctrinate: (1) to teach (someone) to fully accept
the ideas, opinions, and beliefs of a
particular group and to not consider
other ideas, opinions, and beliefs
god is hiding at the corner of my mouth.
god is (hiding) on the corner of hudson and evergreen and watching
two children bleed out. his eyes are wide open.
did he anticipate this on the eighth day?
does he hate all he’s created?
my mouth tastes like iron. bleeds
from the inside-scraping screams i’m not allowed to breathe.
god is watching from the bruised insides
of my thighs; does he want something back?
let me cough up a lung. let me carve my heart out.
let me sanctify myself, post-mortem.
let me make myself anew in awe of him.
god is listening. god is (watching)
this pyre fueled by genocide.
these relics of colonization. these survivors of enslavement.
god is loving us living (starving) (dead).
god is watching my father take a knee to the back
by an officer who calls him spic.
god is watching a man hemorrhage before his daughter.
god is promising to steal back any lightning-born brown boys
he finds hustling on clark in the night time.
here. pray to him again tonight. watch him press his ear
to the hospital room door of a woman whose son is dead.
promise him a visit to la virgen. maybe she can hear us.
god is hiding in the space between a kiss.
he’s creating something holy.
something promised. something doomed.
Liliana is currently working on a degree in English and Spanish, an endeavor made even more exciting by her constant forays into Latin America. In her spare time, she does research on Latinx liberation, aiding her constant efforts to save the world one protest chant at a time. She enjoys Ben & Jerry’s, Spanish rock bands, and dogs almost as much as she does poetry.