As a kid I was fluent in gibberish,

or as most people call it: English.

From balikbayan box VHS tapes,

I picked at the harsh R’s in grinding jaw,

soft L’s where languid tongue stroked roof of mouth

and A’s and O’s rounded,

ending in front in a slobbery kiss.

Americans chew words like gum,

lounging in vowels and slurring syllables —

unlike the chicken bawk bawk of Tagalog:

glottal stops at double vowels (oo!)

consonants falling in line, hanging from one another

like Cream Silk sachets at the sari sari store,

we conjugate syllable stacks, shuffling words

in a magic card spring flourish.

(Sapak, to hit, beefed up when threatening

“Sasapakin kita!”) —consonants filling the cavern

as a wave of Pinay rage rushes through me.

Kita, a kind of word

not found in your impersonal, cold English,

where you and I are mashed together—I the actor,

you the subject—whether it be sapak or mahal

or miss na miss (repetition for emphasis, bawk bawk)

we embrace in the singular.

When I hopped off the plane at SFO, I saw

clouds of English hanging in their mouths,

in the way their lips drawled and slurred,

that harrrd, harrrsh Amerrrican R,

lethargic, lazy, lying down L, and hushing SSSHHH

that rests between teeth, washing me in whispers.

I went up to my pinsan, confident with my syllables

practiced minsan—I’d unlocked

this chewing gum language.

“Hi Dominic!

Shrrshrr arrr shlar! Rrrassshlar!”

And I rounded my jaw

and chewed those R’s and L’s

as if they’d keep my ears from popping.