Growing up in a house of pain,
You sacrifice everything for love.
Like the time my uncle tore open his shirt
And begged his brothers
To let him return to the love
He left in Buenos Aires,
Like the time my mother
Was scratching at her eyes,
Like the time my father both raged and wept.

Days were scenes without direction.
One day a cousin would stab herself
Or an aunt jump from a tower.
I didn’t know what was real;
But what passionate singing I heard,
Tenors, sopranos, baritones–
All around me in full voice;
And there I was, in love with Tosca,
Condemned to death,
And just twelve years old.