This peso
it’s my lucky coin
an amuleto
pressed into my childhood palm
a cushion
but now suspended
from a chain
around my throat.
It’s blessed
for no reason
other than that
she said it was.
It could
have just
as easily been
a pebble
commonplace
from the garden
or
the shed skin
forgotten
of a snake.
That was the age
childhood
in which I believed.
So here I am now
years later
not a child
but in bed
with a fever
cruel
my face sweating,
a fiery mockery
of the February chill
outside.
But
my charm
this peso
still hangs
loyal
between my breasts.
This peso
my lucky coin.
An amuleto.
It just
so happens
to be bad luck
cruel
at the moment