Another girl, Minerva, not much older than Esperanza, has two babies and a husband who keeps leaving but coming back. In "Minerva Writes Poems," Esperanza says that she and Minerva talk and show their poems to each other. Minerva is always sad, always in some kind of trouble. One day she tells her husband to get out and stay out, but he comes back, she lets him in, and then he beats her up again. Minerva asks Esperanza what she can do.
In "Bums in the Attic," Esperanza describes the house she wants to have someday. Her father is a gardener in a wealthy district, and on his day off he used to take his family to look at those places where he works. Now Esperanza refuses to go with them. Still, she wants a house like one of those; she says she'll let passing bums stay at her house, and they can sleep in the attic.
