After Ocean Vuong
The way the light floods the living
room in the late afternoon, so thick
it’s like we’re swimming through honey.
Because today my mom sent me a text
that read don’t give up!
I have yet to make lavender simple syrup from scratch.
There’s a feminist quantum physicist
who’s proved that we can change the past.
Because my cats need laps
to sit on, ankles to bite.
Because there’s always
the temporary mercy of sleep.
To hear the creek’s babble and remember
that I, too, could be a body
of water I love.
Because it is scientifically impossible
for it to be like this forever.
A soft breeze, the butterfly
windchime I saw at the farm.
Cheese.
Because when I asked for help,
it came like a man: so fast.
Because he cannot hurt me anymore.
Weed, and all the witchy stuff I roll with it:
lavender, rose, mugwort, yarrow.
The candle burning on the coffee table,
the slow bolero of the flame.
Because I, too, love to dance.
Because ever since I started naming
spiders after myself, it became easier
to set them free: easier to let them live.
for Micaela, after Ocean Vuong
The September leaves take flight in the wind, as if scared
I am not alone in that, at least
Watching cars hit the broken pavement, bouncing like rubber bands,
you hand me a clementine like an answer,
ordinary and half peeled.
Because when we went grocery shopping the oven pizza was 2 for 1,
so I didn’t have to eat mushrooms and you didn’t have to eat meat.
Because I would have, anyways, if you asked.
Because your sisters look so much like you, they would see you everywhere,
in the oil slick sidewalks and the rearview mirror.
Because you can parallel park with just centimeters to spare,
which means you are too hot to kill yourself
Like how lava’s suicide sprint for water just becomes better earth.
Because it took you five years to learn how to roll a joint
And I haven’t made fun of you enough for that
or how you insist on letting the smoke scorch your lungs
even though you cough at the first drag.
Because when I blow out birthday candles,
I ask for you to breathe deeply, always,
in the lavender fields. While bachata plays, the requinto rioting,
the language you were gifted rising inside of you like yeast.
Because I scraped my sister off the bathroom floor for years
But I retired my spatula. My swiffer. My good gloves.
Because we said we outgrew this at 19,
when I found you in your apartment on the sixth floor,
the one with the good light and terrible heat.
That day you told me about the prima ballerina
who was in love with a girl. You prayed for a world
you could both love and dance in.
In February, you tried to teach me salsa,
but I could never move how you move,
like your hips are tying knots.
Love, I am just asking you to stay
tethered a little longer.
To not let yourself be scared
into taking flight.