Rosaries by Isabella Acuña

Mi abuelo dances to Johnny Cash in a plastic urn.
His dust once defined by base carnality
sits tear-stained in a closet void of vitality.
What better than the body of a sinner to choose to burn?

Tucked away in the corner of a shelf,
behind a shoebox and above luscious furs,
his ashes repent and await a celestial rapture.
Next to him, by my abuela’s forgiving hand, La Virgen herself.

Every night my abuela lays on her side and prays
over his spirit and hers and their holy reunion
forgetting that in her God’s cold and unforgiving union,
out of two sinners, fate might not balance for both to be saved.

I remember watching her gentle prayers as a child
privately from behind a squeaky door frame,
crawling through the shadows in fear, in shame,
and weeping hot tears at a love in death heavenly reconciled.