When Joan Jumped Into the Sea


A small child can swim through the veins of a blue whale. This was how I swam to you in one night. They told me you were lost in war, but I knew you were a fighter. On the third day that you were gone, I walked to the edge of the wooden world and dived into the ocean to get swallowed up. The blue whale ate me in one gulp. I found my way into the whale’s body, nearly drowning as I went. Through each vein I swam, down toward the canyon of his chest. Crawling out of and into the dark blue each time, a restless hand laid pale against any light that could get in. In the middle of the whale was a pulsing city, glittering like a crystal in the wide open sands. It was there I found you, through the veins. In the canyon of a heart that did not belong to you.



The Mermaid

"You are at the kitchen table dicing a cucumber for Tia Reina’s ceviche."


Solgangsbris

"It’s this life I want, this valley / between the hills and high places"