My Abuela's Kitchen at 7 a.m.

Before the house woke up

there was the smell of it—

hot oil and something sweet

and coffee so strong

it felt like a decision.

She never used a recipe.

She used her hands,

which held forty years

of muscle memory

and no patience for measuring.

I watched from the doorway

because children learn more

from watching than asking,

and she knew that

even if she never said it.

Now I stand in my kitchen

in a city she never visited

and I try to make the thing

she made

and it is never quite right.

But the trying is the point.

The trying is the inheritance.