No one wants to / be reminded of / the brutal beauty / of becoming.

I thanked the scissors, / cut the thread I had woven between continents, / families, the uneven fingers of life / and slept with it under my pillow.

Like // the sea, I shatter easily when / touched by beauty

Each silver sequin pinned like petals / of jasmine, frozen in time.

Pain, transitional as rain-blown leaves.

manliness sinks into me like tea leaves / con cuidado tomo cada respiro