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The children of the town had once belonged to the streets. Their laughter rattled off the cracked sidewalks, their games stretched across alleys and fields, and dusk was a sign, not for disconnection, but for one more round of hide-and-seek or patintero, a...
On Womanhood
Being a woman
is thrust upon you.
You walk under stars and suddenly
casually,
make a fist in your pocket and
hold your key—like
a weapon.
It is keen awareness
of fabric length,
and clenched assessment
of skin, padlocks, mirrors, stopping cars,
of home routes, and drink offers.
Being a woman is weighing
the chances of...
Vic Pura
An author is confronted by the protagonist of her 32nd fiction.
She had written a story about the incident, more or less an undisguised one, populated by the same characters with little or no changes in name. I followed suit and just used one...
Birder
In celebration of the October 4 feast of St. Francis of Assisi, patron saint of the environment and all of God's creatures.
Eyes follow the sound
Ears scan the foliage
Breath on hold
Heart gripped still
Mind wiped clear like the sky in the lake
To await
The moment
The presence.
A...
Nesting
I used to bite my tongue a lot. I hated facing things head on. My emotions feel like they have all risen to the surface from years of being anchored down to the sea bed, barnacled and all. I’ve become a lot more...
Shadows of Togetherness
In every harbor, salt clings to skin,
and mothers’ songs drift into dawn,
soft as mango fuzz,
warm as a sun-stroked shoulder.
Markets breathe with spice and voices,
stretching like rope bridges
over rivers carved from memory.
We gather fragments—
grief tasting of smoke and ash,
joy dripping like sugarcane juice,
hope folded...
