Ode to the Overpriced Burrito

photo by Alex Farber

by Luis Lopez-Maldonado

On a chilly spring morning,
chile still clinging to my lips,
I bit into you—warm, heavy, half-hearted—
a freckled tortilla wrapped in betrayal
and $8.79 worth of disappointment.
Where is your abuela, your sazón,
your carne that falls apart like old love letters?
Even your papas taste tired today,
like they miss the days when gas
was under three dollars
and classrooms were still full:
Another Friday… Another row of empty desks.
Another “He moved districts,”
“She got a job,”
“They disappeared.”
The echo of learning, fading fading
like steam from the foil in my hand.
And a thousand miles away
my sister fights cancer like a guerrera
barehead and brown-eyed, eyeliner on point,
still calling me beautiful
between chemo and tortillas hechas a mano—
because even when the world burns,
we still make frijoles and nopales.
And my partner in some kitchen
turning sugar into sonnets,
rolling dough like dreams across steel counters.
He feeds others before he feeds himself—
a soft-spoken genius with hands that bless
without a single prayer: he doesn’t pray.
And as the burrito stares back at me,
it has no answers
it holds no ancestors
it knows no generational trauma—
Nomas hot sauce and liquid eggs
because them chickens are tired of our shit,
because I eat it anyway
because we were taught never to waste
because we understand different tastes
and because hunger doesn’t care
if it’s heritage or habit or miedo:
these roads you see, I remember my mother
singing while she stirred beans
salsa dancing on the stove
papas con chile singing songs,
her, barefoot and holy,
how she taught us to stretch love
through masa and milagros
through torrejas and chismes,
and I remember the chile ristras
swinging from New Mexican porches
like brown-skinned wind chimes
the smell of roasting pods at the corner gas station
and the men selling tamales from coolers
with smiles that knew pain
but still believed in sabor.
Yes, I am tired.
Yes, the burrito was a letdown.
But I am here.
Still teaching. Still writing. Still fighting.
Still refusing to vanish quietly.

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