It had us like fever,
humid and dark
in the back of that bar.
You, in that linen.
Me, in that dress.
Laughing at our waiter
with his dancing mustache
when he teased us
leaving half-drunk bottles
on the table
for something more intoxicating.
We were our own revolution.
A blaze of flower in my hair,
your melt-me smile,
and
our favorite salsa record,
volume just right.
For Shay’s WGWL
Our old town
lies at the bottom of a lake
like Arenal and Tronadora
in Lake Arenal.
New ones have sprung up
like wildflowers
around it.
But, they’re not the same.
Sure, they have
their beautiful distractions
like scenes from a movie—
views of snakes and jaguars
stretching themselves
near waterfalls,
a peacock shimmy-shaking
on the grass,
little pastel houses
clinging to cliffs.
But this isn’t what I want.
Never was.
Even back before we had money.
You know I’d live on love.
I’d sell it all and move
to Nicoya on the cheap
to feel that way again.
When I set the table for dinner,
and select a juicy tomato for the salad,
asking you what you imagine
chupacabra looks like,
I’m not just musing at random.
What I’m really saying is—
I’ve forgotten the mystery of you,
the wild smell of you up close,
and what it did to me.
I can’t even think of it now.
And so, I scuttle about
getting stuck
in the drying cement
of our resentments,
drowning for what
the fish only know now,
dancing around
our old town.
NPM Day 28
Sometimes I see us both
at the ocean shore
looking out.
You are wading further out from me
wearing your swimming trunks
and cheerful broken heart.
I want to cry out, Come Back,
and I do
cry out.
But you are gone—
an ocean between us.
Swinging prayers
like lanterns over the deep,
I hope for the light to
reach you,
for you to surface,
a Chinook
in the hook of your hands,
realizing what a catch you are.
NPM Day 24