Ina Cariño

Infinitives

Milk

a brown sister told me someone told her white people smell like milk
so I took a good long whiff of one brought him home with me

let him sleep in my bed he kept me safe kept me from lonely
so I kept him from spoiling from curdling kept him

at night he dripped milk into me my fingers gripping his bony limbs
my brown awash in milk rinsed & cooled I slurped it up

maybe he loved me but only as white boys love guavas
from a warm country pink-soft insides fragrant other

maybe I loved him but only as a brown girl loves a white thing
a so-called pure thing makintab a shiny lie one day

I met his onion-skin mother his candle-stump father we talked
about Asia you know that giant country onion-mother said

my English was great no accent! candle-father said I looked exotic
are you—Polynesian? they may as well have asked what it’s like

to wake up smelling like dung like tarantulas burnt rice
or flies in summer heat smelling like monsoon mildew mud

stink bugs circling instead they asked if I’d tried dog asked
if I’ve ever once burned rice because I must be so good at it

I don’t need a recipe they all laughed so later that night
I took my white boy to my lola’s house pulled down a jar

of black vinegar sukang itim dipped my tongue in it kissed him
you shoulda seen his pale face go see-through chalk dissolving

reverse alchemy now when I talk of white people I tell my brown sister
baho they stink of milk so I let mine go

she still shakes her head at me says bobo why are you so stupid
says I was lucky to be so close to one who smells of milk

but when milk turns sour ferments blooms fetid under the nose
the only thing to do is pour it down the drain