Survival
-
night letter to my mother
you lie to yourself // i learn late to work inside the bodyslow madness // in the end you mend // the broken partsi lieyou die working // the body gave up // and in my final act// i try to mend // the broken piecesthe mirror breaksyou walk the same dirty sidewalksbefore you were…
-
the house on fire
Themes: labor, inherited, survival, desire, bilingual the house on firewe were made to stay insidethe borderline. safety is not beyond measureyou once said, as we cross the plains in smoketo head to guánica baywe must first pass the sunflower fieldsthe red bricks of ghetto living onceheld the sun,the heat was pressed into my backnowdecayfresh orange en…
-
grayscale // when love demands
Themes: Love // Hope // Faith grayscalewhen the ocean is black, i pacethe long corridor of the summer/homea mouth stirs the room. the walls hum and light won’t sleep. the dark altersmy skin against an unyielding arm i should brace the furnace—but i stay, watching how we drumbeneath the skin, bodies riggedto learn each other…
-
Senseless // Litany for the Broken Body
Themes: Love // Silence // Queerness // Queer Body // Desire // Bilingual SenselessMost people would’ve ghostedBut me?I call it love—I just wanted to worship the ignition,the firestarter who kissed like a loaded gunand left a trail across my skinlike something meant to burn.But here we are—tracing the heat your body left behind;you, reciting a…
-
in the valley where sunflowers burn // smoke and missing father
Two American sonnets en Borinkén Themes: Family // Love // Silence // Queerness // Borinkén in the valley where sunflowers burnawake, i find wood burningin a house not too far off. palm trees bow,in prayer, but collapse. a sheet of tarlooms above the mountain’s base—so thick, it presses like molasses mixingwith scrambled eggs. a smoke-slick…
Luis E. Santos 