June 25, 2025
[encore] 387: Stop Looking At My Last Name Like That by Michael Torres

June 25, 2025
[encore] 387: Stop Looking At My Last Name Like That by Michael Torres
Today’s episode was originally released on May 19, 2020.
Stop Looking At My Last Name Like That
by Michael Torres
Nothing in my life was crooked or broken. Or potholed. Not haggard or tired. Not poor and unfortunate. Nor merely lucky. No one’s father returned from work with calloused palms every evening. No one got to where they were in life with the help of a new-to-the-area teacher, who stopped at nothing until our dreams came to fruition. Please. Our parents paid for those university tours. On weekends, we went out like families do. The zoo, science museums. Summers, my parents said I love you, leaving me at camp where I earned badges spinning twigs until sparks spilled out. In September, no one came to class with torn or tattered clothes. No one got beat up for being less than. Please. Boyhood was a ballad. Our parents sang when they bathed our brothers. No one became what this world carved out of desperation. When it rained, we got picked up from school. At home, a change of clothes sat on our beds. Yes, we all had our own beds. Yes, each of us had our own rooms, as well. We made boats out of egg cartons. There were no gunshots or helicopters to stop us from sailing those ships down the not-so-flooded street. With the world ahead, we opened our small yellow umbrellas a sudden burst of sunlight we walked right into.
"Stop Looking At My Last Name Like That," by Michael Torres, from AN INCOMPLETE LIST OF NAMES by Michael Torres, copyright © 2020 Beacon Press. Used by permission of Beacon Press.