What was promised me
after Cecilia Woloch
Nothing. Bandaids for broken bones. Papercuts and pebbles in my shoe. How stars feel on a clear night, trickling pixels hand over hand over sky over sea over air, to me. My grandmother’s ring, never recovered. The scent of tomatoes on my fingers long afterwards, blossoms, and rootlessness. Delft blau, the wrinkled recipe card for boterkoek and Pake’s speculaas—the hints of ginger and almonds like a cloak. A few whispers, a story to write, to keep. The humid scent of the night- time flowers holding me like a kiss, and a few bites of magic dust. Or beans. A fish hook and a tablesaw and a toolbelt, rain-wrecked, shipwrecked, I wept, too. A bookshelf and a fireplace, but not at the same time, not forever. Spiderwebs with dancing rain droplets, the first snow while picking the last of the apple crop, a few constellations in a galaxy I can’t see. Promised, enough for today, and some to share. The open road, the high seas: I took them for myself, by myself, a ship adrift but alight, and a song.
Lisa López Smith writes from her home in rural Mexico. When she’s not wrangling children or goats or rescue dogs, you can probably find her riding her bike. Her recent publications include Lacuna Magazine, Mothers Always Write, Sin Fronteras, CuiZine, and Animal Literary Magazine.