Dimitri Reyes: I Told the Brother Gracias

Dimitri Reyes: I Told the Brother Gracias
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For Armando

Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sins — Peter 4:8

 

I told the brother gracias,

for coming to me in his best spanish.

 

Yes, yes my eyes were a little wet.

I assumed Jehovah witnessed them

 

through tinted lenses and pushed

the hermano towards me. He called

 

himself Armando. His corduroys

faded into a bathroom mortar blue.

 

They didn’t reflect his posture, nor his

strong grip. His boisterousness in saying

 

explicame esto. The neatness of his mustache

made him every abuelo. We spoke in spanglish,

 

He recited his best verses, calling them all poems.

His words became tears and his words poured into me.

 

What our worlds couldn’t connect our lenguajes

did in spirit. For the rest of the busride I drank

his scripture that quenched an unknown thirst.


Dimitri Reyes is a SortaRican PuertoVegan poet born and raised in Newark, New Jersey. Through experience, his poetry becomes a meditation on veganism, well-being, Latinx culture, and growing up in the inner city. Dimitri is currently  a candidate in the Rutgers- Newark MFA program and his poetry is published or forthcoming in Acentos Review, Naugatuck River Review, Radius, DrylandLit, and others.