Before the world was breath, we were shimmer two wisps of stardust folded into the hush between pulse and becoming. Not born, not made, just

Should I ever forget, remind me, dear one, that the home for my arms is embracing you, my hands resting on the small of your

It was supposed to be you, anthem- chested, totem-armed you. I was supposed to hop a Southwest flight to Tennessee and drop the return ticket into

In your eyes is the autumnal blue, like a field of lavender flowers in a summer sky; the seeds of winter lies waiting for the

Your heart said it was wrong, I was as off-limits as they come. We never meant to fall in love so, we called our tryst

Love snuck in slowly, walking barefoot— a thief in the night, stealing fragments of myself before I even noticed. Your smile— as pure as the first dewdrop. Your laughter— the melody hidden inside each moment. We lingered in each other’s presence, savoring every second— a banquet of sweetness, unending, seemingly still, time suspended in memory, vanished, yet vivid. Each day, small things unfold, tied by a delicate thread, held within the net of our hopes and fears— woven together, subtle, and breakable. Love, once a distant dream, now lives within our hearts. We taste wild honey

Or rather you don’t know That I am the type who falls in love Who will dribble you in my sleep And look for your

Your mother told me how the rain came down in sheets the morning you were born too soon in the back of a station wagon,

Today I found the path she had so long worked to clear swallowed up by prairie grasses. I’d watched her felling trees and grinding stumps,

A mosaic is forming, A sprinkle of unplanned smiles, an equal amount of denial One part butterflies, an elephant to complement the rest A generous

When I was six years old and my familia was living in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania on Thomas Boulevard, my madre got very ill, and my hermano

Martyr me      on the first day of autumn     when morning tastes     of salt and death     and the

Last name was Notario never knew their first names. I was a cashier summer job restaurant by the Bay. He would come in first take

When we were kids an alley separated our houses, you were the new girl; all exotic from the city, your dad didn’t have calluses; called

Small things: not returning a phone call right away, not offering early enough to set tables at the spaghetti feed for the homeless, not filling