Poem by Jess

                              SNAP

Sometimes, I still remember, the despair in your eyes,
As we lined up in the checkout line,
Nine boxes of hamburger helper,
I think I’m too pretty to have to eat.
So I sit at the table and pretend to maneuver around my plate,
Thinking one day, I’ll sit in beautiful restaurants with pretty black plates,
And he’ll tell me I can order whatever I want...
Mcdonald’s a late night drunk stop,
Not an thirty-five minute walk,
Once a month, as a “treat” in a South Texas parking lot.
Minimum wage is three dollars, so we dig for quarters in corners of couches,
For the black bags of laundry we load into grocery carts,
To walk thirty five minutes, across from the Once A Month Mcdonalds,
And then walk our clean clothes, back in black bags and grey carts,
Sweating up and down hills through Los Angeles heights,
Clothes we just washed, sweating among their own socks.
The four of us live on Lone Star, SNAP in other states,
It’s hardly enough, for older brother in football.
Eldest daughter in swim.
Jars of .95 cent Ragus and .50 cent spaghetti noodles,
Topped with American cheese, made in bulk.
And the girl in me just wants to snap,
Watching her try to even entertain Thanksgiving.
So I eat extra at school and friends houses.
Twenty years later, just me,
I still pray and near cry in grocery lines,
Even though I know my card won’t decline.

---

BIO: Jess is a Mexican American writer and human rights activist from South Texas. She has been published by the International Human Rights Art Movement, Writers Resist, Missing Perspectives and Dissent Voices. She is nominated for a PEN Robert Dau and Pushcart Short Story Prize. Her work focus on intergenerational trauma, reconciliation through narrative power and Mexican American experience in America.