Q’anjob’al is an alien language in a U.S. court of law.
What Mayans have left Guatemalan highlands,
escaped the Sinaloa through Mexico, then
learned Spanish in time to battle
laws written in English and
served by English
speakers in
the USA
?

Ana begged the judge, “Leave me in a cell, please.
Leave me in a cell.” What did she escape to
ask for this? Unspeakable and perhaps
unheard by the ears who could tilt
and balance like the scales of
Lady Justice. Q’anjob’al is
alien, finds
no ears.

Their home grounds were already fouled at leaving,
at birthing of their children, at marriages to
their mates, at first plots of gringo
conspirators, at first lust after
their markets and contras.
Foreign guile seeped
ppm into mamas’
placentas.

Casa del Migrante in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico is bricked
red like a firehouse, an iron gated early warning.
Bienvenidos hermanos y hermanas migrantes,
and they come and go in neon colors
through El Paso until the desert
slakes them or the ICE
in Texas breaks
them.