6th-8th grade

my hands are still my hands
like my grandfather’s hands
are his hands and they
are on the window
attached…

Again, an ousted child or orphan happens onto a den.
It happens then. Invitation by faun or badger to…

December. In Odesa,
power stations, shelled.
Your father’s friend
shivers in his apartment
crammed with …

The redolence of rose and new road.
The attar of grass, recently cut.
The fish-whiff of anchovy.
The spinning…

No
I don’t dance horses
I am not a mariachi
I am not a baile folklorico dancer
I am not the half-time show…

There is a framed photograph of my grandmother
She is a young woman, sitting on a horse, vestida de china…

I am a feminist who loves my sport
and the machismo in charrería often gets to me

To be clear
I am not …

Brother charro
do you realize
that it is because of escaramuza
that you have an audience?

Our performances…

they announce us      Valentina Covarrubias montada en Viento
my girl does not cower           does not wave or smile…

 rain passed through

 just now
 rain

 chxósh

chxósh

 chxósh

 chxósh

 rain rained

now
 rainbow
 stretches

water   …

Well she actually said
if you were an Ewok I would rescue you and name you Sunshine
build you a tiny…

night drapes
stars emit light
around the north star-fire
stars journey
in their wake
stories extend…

chahóółhxeel
sǫ’ bitsádinidiin
nahookǫs bikǫ’
binaago deikaah
sǫ’ binahjį’
hane’ náás oot’ih

 ániid nahóółtą́

 ániidigo
 nahóółtą́ą

 chxósh

chxósh

 chxósh

 chxósh

 naanahóółtą́

k’ad
 nááts…

until the clock of my grandmother’s body
                   stopped working & her remains

were lowered into the earth on…

Don’t. The past is overcrowded with the future 
closer than you think. You blink, that’s one 
eon; a yawn…

Something will change every day.
I moved six times. I felt like I was traveling.
But something will …

I remember first hearing rumors
of the atom. We are all made up
of crumbs, Q told me
when we were kids.…

If, even now, I am excited about it: every cow & horse,
every canoe on the surface of Pyramid Lake—…

To all the boys
who asked me
to dance and to 
all the boys to whom
I said yes and to 
all the steps we took…