I asked her
One time
If she saw me
Really saw me
I asked her if she could understand
that we were made of the same salt
The same wounds
The pain of a million mothers
The wail of the earth
She couldn't
Or maybe she wouldn't
I tried to show her
But I didn't have the words
“How can you not see it for yourself?”
We are the network of cells that persist
The celestial soup
We are the waking universe
Gazing back on itself
The breath that we contain
Has been here since creation
Since the birth of time
Since that fateful night
With that bewitched fruit
I remember so clearly
Las calles de mi ciudad natal
The bloom of the hydrangeas
Y la parada cerca de mi casa donde los pequeños jugaban
Sweat dripping from their unruly brows
La fuerza del calor del verano que los golpeaba desde arriba
I could never play with these kids
Porque mi lengua no encajaba dentro del idioma como la de ellos
It’s theirs
Pero es mi lengua también
¿no?
Esa puerta pesada
Se me estrelló en la cara
Ella es gringa
No me entiende
De niña no comprendía
Pero ahora sí
I made space for those kids
Quienes nunca hicieron espacio para mí
COLD PLUNGE
there is a natural cold spring
almost seven miles southeast
next to a run-down gas station
and a pizzeria dripping grease
there’s clarity here
it speaks in tongues to me
riddled with pebbles, moss,
and mental liberty
yet i stand there and scream internally
small plots of earth
and heaven, too
my fingers hurt
already blue
a crisp frigid wake runs its ceaseless race
subterranean warmth billowing beneath
that furnace churns its sheath of heat
fish visit us in intervals
as migrants sing their mating calls
the ground is much more cynical
unearthing fine-tuned minerals
intentional
yet cyclical
i will dip my skin in
numb and grim
small hills arise from toes to chin
muscles seeking warmth but finding grief
four minutes passed yet no relief
i shudder now, eyes towards the ceiling
an extant state of thought and feeling
you are one with the bank
the hilly source coaxes
life is anything but simple
jorge proposes
