She uncovered her voice from her bed,
loaded the verbs,
stirred up the interjections’ beehive;
she gathered the air in her lungs

i drew a smiley face on a blank page & gave it legs / there is no wind strong enough to destroy something that only exists on paper / there is no hurt powerful enough to tear

apart this cage I call a body / i have made this shell for you with my hands / & maybe death only comes when our souls outgrow our bodies / like hermit crabs — we drop

do not forget to drag your feet, my darling,
for the road is long and the trees cannot protect you here
and though their hands may urge you forward
look behind,

you could still pretend for a while. Perhaps it wasn’t even pretend—your body still remembered home as a pause between your third and fourth ribs; remembered an absence of walking across a bridge, in this city you’ve chosen as refuge, and keening the surface tension of water."

“Pies, para qué los quiero si tengo alas para volar?”*
― Frida Kahlo (1907–1954)

The blueprint was hidden under Frida Kahlo's bed, where she rested her feet,
after the accident. Engineers puzzled over the design, knowing not what

do not forget to drag your feet, my darling,
for the road is long and the trees cannot protect you here
and though their hands may urge you forward
look behind,

I sew behind time
and feel too much
in the dusty yard of the seamstresses’ house.
Space fighters scream across the dark dome of sky overhead.

Tell me the story of something ending, she said at the campfire,
The story of something that tastes like vinegar
And crunches like beetle shells between my teeth.

they’d tell me
how much a fox’s honour is worth
without weighing it so why not
steal a boy’s honour
braid it in as
another triumph
bask in this
demonic glory

On this world all the colors are named anew
with each child. I have a word for yellow &

a word for blue, but it will not help me talk
to another soul in this city. We point to