A Kiss
And sometimes it is
loss
that we lose,
and sometimes
it is just lips. When I was
a child, I would ask my mother
to tuck me
in, wrap me tight in blankets,
make me into a burrito.
Sometimes I would wait in bed,
pressing my body stiff, like a board,
mind like a feather, silly— setting the scene
to be seen.
So I could be wrapped.
So I could be kissed.
And what
I miss most,
is being made again.
Credit
Copyright © 2015 by David Tomas Martinez . Used with permission of the author.
About this Poem
“This poem explores a Heraclitean idea of love, showing how, in the end, we often miss some of the most mundane things about the person lost, such as a kiss. This poem is an attempt to wiggle my toes in the stream of that kiss.”
—David Tomas Martinez
Author
David Tomas Martinez

David Tomas Martinez received his MFA from San Diego State University. He is the author of Post Traumatic Hood Disorder (Sarabande Books, 2018) and Hustle (Sarabande Books, 2014), winner of the Devil's Kitchen Poetry Reading Award. A recipient of a Pushcart Prize and the Verlaine Poetry Prize, Martinez has received fellowships from CantoMundo, the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, and the National Endowment for the Arts. He was the Guest Editor for Poem-a-Day for Hispanic Heritage Month, from September 14–October 13, 2020, and lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Date Published: 2015-03-06
Source URL: https://poets.org/poem/kiss-1