The Poet X

For the next few days, Xiomara shuts out everyone in her world, including Caridad, Xavier, and Aman. At church on Sunday, Xiomara asks Father Sean if she can give a confession under pressure from her parents. Xiomara “just want[s] to tell them, / it’s NOT THAT DEEP” (225), so when she meets Father Sean and tells him what happened on the train, she admits to him that she’s “‘not sorry I kissed a boy. / I’m only sorry I was caught. / Or that I had to hide it at all’” (226). Father Sean understands that there is more to discuss, so he approaches Mami and suggests to her that Xiomara “keep / coming to classes[…] / but not take the leap of confirmation this year” (228). When Mami reacts badly to this idea, Father Sean reminds her that “‘anger is as much as a sin / as any Xiomara may have committed’” (229). While talking alone with Xiomara, Mami is furious, comparing Xiomara to her father, “‘a man addicted to women’” (231). Xiomara reflects in writing on her mother’s anger and her feelings of heartache, but though she “spend[s] every class writing in [her] journal” (237),