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Suddenly, rain. Our heads
bowed together like monks
in this hot green place.
I study the slow script
of her movements. The cross
and uncross of her legs,
fingers forking together,
pulling apart. Secret dialect
of her face—a firefly flick
in the iris, lips curling
like kelp. Speak, mother.
Your daughter is listening.
Copyright © 2019 Angela Narciso Torres. This poem was originally published in Quarterly West. Used with permission of the author.
Something of late November
sifting through a window
brings back this prelude—
two voices blend, I lean
into the keys, draw back
when the voices part.
How the body remembers—
Señora V in a floral sundress,
rose talcum hand soft
on the curve of my spine
imprinting what she knew
of love and time. How could I know
what those notes would mean
decades of preludes ahead.
Carpenter ants picked the T-bone clean.
The dog’s leash tautened toward
a square of sun.
A hallway lamp wavered.
Slice of lit motes through
the cracked bedroom door.
Her slipper under the bed, another on the armchair.
On the shell comb, a single strand.
Her blue robe still damp.
*
a narrow bed in an endless
row of beds tucked tight
like chalk-white pills
cocooned in plastic