Geri Gutwein

Making Tortillas

for my mother

I should have mastered how she made tortillas,

how she measured with her cupped hand

the right amount of flour, lard, salt, baking powder,

warm water, mixed it to the right consistency,

how she worked the dough into perfectly round, ball-shaped

buns to be pressed into perfectly round-shaped disks

with her seasoned, wooden, rolling pin that never

stuck to moist dough, how she picked up each tortilla

and clapped it into shape before throwing it on the

hot, cast iron, stove plate that was perfect for toasting

tortillas into light, brown, freckled, flat bread that we could

use to scoop up rice hot from the stove, or roll

into burritos filled with cheesy frijoles. I should have

mastered how she swiped at sweat on her brow

with the hankie she kept tucked up her sleeve.

I stand before an empty bowl,

see a table stacked high with tortillas,

dishes of rice and beans, the language of her love,

while we wait with open mouths and empty hands for more.

Sometimes, in the middle of the night,

When her leg muscles tightened, formed

an egg-shaped knot protruding from her calf,

she woke me, then bridged her leg to my bed.

In half sleep I massaged away her knotted pain.

When she could finally stretch her leg, we slept,

aware of the other’s breathing and the knowledge

that sometimes, in the middle of the night,

comfort was a twin bed away.

We never dreamed ourselves as women sleeping

in separate homes, lives as distant

as the earth to the moon, longing for the time

when pain was released in the familiar