Palabritas

I immigrated to the United States when I was three. Standing on the bottom of the plane ramp, I said, "¡Hace mucho frió!" With his arms wrapped tightly around me, my father said, "It is very cold; we are in America; we speak English now."

My throat felt tight, and it was hard to swallow. At that moment, I felt I had lost my language, Spanish. I learned English in a short time, but English sounded harsh and was difficult to rhyme.

I wrote the poem "Palabritas" (Little Words) many years later. The poem appears on the screen written in its original Spanglish form. The English translation was evasive: one had to catch the translation at just the right moment. I felt it reflected the frustration of having to learn English and not speak Spanish. 

On the right side of the screen is an interactive video that animates the poem. On the bottom of the screen is the face of a little girl. If you click on her, an image of a room appears. 

Muneca, doll, is a surreal room where objects are triggers to short stories that appear on the screen.