Sampaguita
Would you have loved me
If they called me Jasmine
Instead of Sampaguita
If my name sat familiar
Like Smith, or King, or Roe
Would you have brought my bouquet
To your mother if I could crush
The foreigner from my name
Distill myself into a perfume or jasmine tea
Tint my skin lighter, lighter, lighter
To match the holy white of a sampaguita
To match the empty hue of common jasmine
How much do I change for you
To say you love me beyond closed doors
Because you said you’d love me in the dark
You said it quietly—so I had to lean in close
I had to keep you near so I could hear it
My face turned up to yours
Like flowers to sunlight
I wilted in your shadow
Shrank and grew colder
My face turned up to yours
Like flowers reaching for sunlight
Contorted to find room to grow
But in your absence
I grew out wildflowers from broken vines
Reached up to the sky and blossomed
Kept myself warm enough to bloom each morning year round without you
And in this morning hour I remembered my name
Like a melody
Like a prayer
Slipping from lungs to lips to air
Feeding the flowers so they too can grow
Victoria Bautista (she/her) is a FilAm poet from Oklahoma and Bacolod City who consistently mixes up Illongo works she learned from her mom and Tagalog words she learned from her pops. She currently resides in Washington, D.C. and works in government to pay for a never ending quest to find the best halo halo in the DMV. She has performed and competed in slam poetry since 2012 and this is her first published work. You can find her on Twitter @victoriainspace.