Poetry

Dear, Venezuela and Greenland,

A couple months ago I wrote

A poem apologizing to Canada,

And saying that they DO NOT

Belong to us.

I’m deeply angered,

Saddened,

And heartbroken

I was never allowed in the basement, 

there was always a lock on the door,

and my parents avoided telling me why.

Great parenting strategy, 

not even making up a lie for me,

The sky wears billowing gowns, layers

Upon layers of silk fluttering

With the breeze, and

She dances in it with ease, never

Tripping or stumbling but

I talked with this third grader on the bus

she asked to see my watch face. 

I showed her and said, 

"this is me and my boyfriend at a concert we played

at the Flynn"

are you still in love?

It really sucks to be a girl

In a man's world

Everything designed

So it is never your time

Everything is rigged so you don’t succeed

The girls,

the little kids on the bus, 

switching seats and grabbing friends and TALKING

loud and jarring

life is joy, to them,

life is play.

I want them to stay there.

[This is a reposted edited version of a previous poem of mine.]

when all we have is spent–

what will we have left?

people once before us–

When I look at you,

the world feels like it finally chose the right ending.

No scripts, no staged lines,

just two hearts learning their way through the same story.

You don’t need crowns to be royalty.

Mi portóncito

My little gate that swings me across the same arc across the tile patio floor;

the cold metal gray bars pressed to my face, hanging on to

Mi portóncito- the one taking me home

I can hear the party still going 

starting in the kitchen,

spilling into the dining room 

and out onto the deck 

I hear the sound of fizzy champagne filling crystal glasses

you are a petty man.

not a leader,

merely a tyrant.

no worry for

the whiteless.

no concern for

the non-cisgender.

Say you're a president.

Not a king.

If that's true then what's happening in Venezuela? 

You removed a ruthless dictator, yes,

but you just replaced him with another.