Santino’s Galore

by Monica Sifuentes Mireles

Droplets of sweat caress my face gently

Small smears of a stranger’s blood covers regions of my gloves

A cacophonic sound of a cheap, plastic whistle

From it, erupts an intense crowd

Another win

Way to go, Sani

They say, lightheartedly hitting my head

as I walk out

The passion of many

are laid on the knuckles of my hands

While my heart and conscience rests elsewhere

Someplace, light years away from the field,

my hands are traversing a pure canvas,

instead of moving towards another being

Someplace, shut away from everyone else

instead of boxing gloves,

a wooden paint brush is my weapon

and purple paint is plastered around, instead on that of another’s face

Someplace, secluded within the ring of my soul

there is a little boy, with the imagination of Leonardo DaVinci,

loaded with the sentiments of Pablo Picasso

flowing with the colors of Diego Rivera

and with the arduous passion to create

But his physicality contradicts

His hands are those of Muhammad Ali,

his body that of an athletic professional,

and his face with a facade of brutality

The desire to tell him

Go draw that person,

even if your hand is too rough and breaks

a million pencils

Go paint that landscape,

even if the brush’s bristles

burst

Color that page,

Sculpt that clay, 

with those calloused fingers 

Because,

Santino,

talent is meaningless,

if the passion for it

resides in the home of

another.