How I Put Myself through School

There is a label specifically for organic meats and caviaron the refrigerator shelf of the woman whose house I clean.

Another on a rack for the well-traveled chardonnays and sauvignons,below the crystal champagne flutes, reminding me what goes where.

I systematize her cupboards and nail-clipping-infested junk drawer,while her children, the underweight, disobedient darlings, stare

as I reshelve their dolls and brand-new books. Stare as their motherstares. Stare as I pour the ajo y cebolla of my blood into a pot of rice

that will end up in the trash because of its spice. Stare as I shakethe wrinkles out of faded cotton panties and boxer shorts—

the lingering heat of the dryer taking me to a bedroomI never wanted to be in. Sweat beading at the bridge of my nose,

I accept the clothes she collects in trash bags for my daughterswho are younger but much bigger, knowing they will never fit,

and wonder, if she could, would she pierce the skin of my gut,scrape the eggs from my womb, spread them like a good Beluga,

eliminating me and any other chance at adding to the fiery Chicanitaswho ask, Why do you take her used things, Mama?