<html aria-label="message body"><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div><span style="font-size: 22px;">Day Of The Dead</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">It is not simply the Day of the Dead—loud, and parties.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">More quietly, it is the day of my dead. The day of your dead.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">These days, the neon of it all, the big-teeth, laughing skulls,</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">The posed calacas and Catrinas and happy dead people doing funny things—</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">It’s all in good humor, and sometimes I can’t help myself: I laugh out loud, too.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">But I miss my father. My grandmother has been gone</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Almost so long I can’t grab hold of her voice with my ears anymore,</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Not easily. My mother-in-law, she’s still here, still in things packed</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">In boxes, her laughter on videotape, and in conversations.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Our dog died several years ago and I try to say his name</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Whenever I leave the house—You take care of this house now,</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">I say to him, the way I always have, the way he knows.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">I grew up with the trips to the cemetery and pan de muerto,</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">The prayers and the favorite foods, the carne asada, the beer.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">But that was in the small town where my memory still lives.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Today, I’m in the big city, and that small town feels far away.</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br style="font-size: 22px;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"> - Alberto Rios</span><br style="font-size: 22px;"><br><br><br><br></div></body></html>