How radiant, your Lustering lips which pour sweet moonlight onto our eyes for better seeing. How sharp and well observed, your Cupid’s peak distinct— not quite Angel, not quite Diva— a little Flirty & Perky Pink never hurt anybody. Your Love Test suggests Red Rock. The right to say, Viva Glam! was all you everContinueContinue reading “Ode to Lipstick”
Author Archives: Virginia Valenzuela
Limpia la Ropa
In the laundromat you read books and listen to Chopin. On both tv’s the same show is playing at slightly different times, which is why you try not to forget your headphones. The machines are half dead and the dryers only run on high or low. It’s nighttime, so the air is sticky, and theContinueContinue reading “Limpia la Ropa”
On Perseverance
“It was not Death, for I stood up and all the Dead, lie down—” Emily Dickinson
Sidewalk Chalk
i. Every Thursday afternoon I watch you play the playground. You climb the bars and twist the swings singing pop songs with mostly your own words. ii. Last Thursday, I brought a box of sidewalk chalk and we bent our necks making a blue and orange mandala. You had never known that these wereContinueContinue reading “Sidewalk Chalk”
Brown Eyes
I like to watch your eye twitch watch your nose bleed, watch your cat drink, and when I watch you I think of molasses, sweet and bitter, how once you told me about molasses cookies on Sundays like cartoons your eye twitching again as you look into my eyes and ask is there silence underwater?
Argentine Tea Time
iced passion tango you and me, querido little here, little there your claws around my jugular black and white stiletto wrapped around your ego we dance the dance not saying much we’re doing what we know and me, a tea cup, spitting into your mouth, which only swallows
On Trust
“I live my life in widening circles that stretch out over the world. I may not complete this last one, but I give myself to it.” Rainer Maria Rilke
Candles
I don’t want to blow out the candles of your past lives. I want to know, what about the fire did a younger you find welcoming and tender? What about these candles comes into your body and mind troubling you with shadows and taking your focus elsewhere? I do not wish to know the nameContinueContinue reading “Candles”
Berlin
She rides a borrowed bike between Berlin streets and graffiti piles– the sky is gray, but not sad, and all day it will not rain, though it could have whenever it wanted to. She arches her back for better posture, but the clouds are rather heavy. Left down Schönhouser Allee left the map at homeContinueContinue reading “Berlin”
Ocean
Then one day, the Princess walked the knight to the train, where he kissed her and bid her goodnight. Turning away, his armor unhinged and fell to the ground, trailing behind in a little stream. The Princess waited. She waited a long time. Six months went by and by then the stream had grown intoContinueContinue reading “Ocean”
Virginia Valenzuela 