I'm Denice Frohman, and this is "Accents." my mom holds her accent like a shotgun, with two good hands. her tongue, all brass knuckle slipping in between her lips her hips, are all laughter and wind clap. she speaks a sanchocho of spanish and english, pushing up and against one another, in rapid fire there is no telling my mama to be "quiet," my mama don't know "quiet." her voice is one size better fit all and you best not tell her to hush, she waited too many years for her voice to arrive to be told it needed house keeping. English sits in her mouth remixed so "strawberry" becomes "eh-strawbeddy" and "cookie" becomes "eh-cookie" and kitchen, key chain, and chicken all sound the same. my mama doesn't say "yes" she says, "ah ha" and suddenly the sky in her mouth becomes a Hector Lavoe song. her tongue can't lay itself down flat enough for the English language, it got too much hip too much bone too much conga too much cuatro to two step got too many piano keys in between her teeth, it got too much clave too much hand clap got too much salsa to sit still it be an anxious child wanting to make Play-Doh out of concrete English be too neat for her kind of wonderful. her words spill in conversation between women whose hands are all they got sometimes our hands are all we got and accents that remind us that we are still bomba, still plena you say "wepa" and a stranger becomes your hermano, you say "dale" and a crowd becomes a family reunion. my mother's tongue is a telegram from her mother decorated with the coqui's of el campo so even when her lips can barely stretch themselves around english, her accent is a stubborn compass always pointing her towards home.
我是丹妮斯佛羅曼, 這首詩叫做《口音》。 我媽媽持有她口音的方式, 就像拿著一把獵槍, 用雙手緊握著著。 她的舌頭,如同戴著銅環的手指頭, 在雙脣間滑動、摩擦。 她的臀部,是笑聲和風的拍打。 她說的是大雜燴,西班牙語和英語 向上推擠,擠向彼此,在快火當中。 不可能告訴我媽媽要「安靜」, 我媽媽不知道什麼叫「安靜」。 她的聲音是單一尺碼通通適用的, 且你最好不要叫她別作聲, 她等待了太多年 才等到她的聲音到來, 被告知它需要清理。 英語坐在她的嘴巴中, 被再次混合, 於是「草莓(strawberry)」 變成了「eh-strawbeddy」, 「餅干(cookie)」 變成了「eh-cookie」, 而廚房(kitchen)、鑰匙圈 (key chain)、雞(chicken) 聽起來都一樣。 我媽媽不會說「是」, 她會說「啊哈」, 而突然間,她嘴裡的天空 就變成了赫克特拉佛的歌曲。 她的舌頭無法讓自己躺平到 符合英語的需求。 它有太多臀部, 太多骨頭, 太多康加舞, 太多四弦吉他,無法跳兩步舞, 有太多鋼琴鍵 在她的牙齒間, 它有太多響木, 太多拍手, 有太多騷莎舞而無法坐定。 它像個焦慮的孩子,想要 把混凝土變成培樂多黏土。 英語太工整,不適合她那種美好。 她的話語在談話中溢濺, 談話的是兩個女子, 雙手是她們僅有的, 有時,我們的雙手是我們僅有的, 還有口音,提醒著我們, 我們仍然美好,仍然充實。 你說「wepa」, 一名陌生人變成了你的兄弟, 你說「dale」, 一群人變成了家人團聚。 我媽媽的舌頭是 來自她媽媽的電報, 用埃爾坎波的科奎鷓鴣裝飾, 所以即使當她的嘴脣幾乎無法 依據英語來延展它們自己, 她的口音是個固執的羅盤, 總是為她指出 家的方向。