I am a pat of pearl-colored flamingos
_ _ I am a towel fading by the bathroom sink
I am a set of new bed sheets _ _ not yet washed
_ _ I am the broken swing set near collapsed
I am crabapple buds swollen on a February tree
_ _ I am a knob of roots waiting_ _ for someone to pull
I am a stamp collection in a case
_ _ I am lost_ _ letters unsent & yellowed
I am snakeskin_ _ dried_ _ under a microscope
_ _ I am bundled sage meant to burn for cleansing
I am the doll painted as candy skull
_ _ I am two lanterns_ _ one broken_ _ & the night watch long—
Two lanterns against the long night
_ _ I am the doll my mother caressed as she lay dying
I am bundled sage_ _ a gift_ _ a prayer
_ _ I am dried snakeskin_ _ remnants of the past
I am lost but found_ _ grace in every bruised crevice
_ _ I am a collection of horses in the field
I am a knob on a door to a celestine attic
_ _ I am apple blossoms against the bluest sky
I am broken_ _ wounds filling with gold
_ _ I am a bed sheet’s pleated shine nightjars of desire
I am a towel_ _ wet with dewdrop
_ _ I am pearl & flamingo_ _ the sweetest light
Alicia Elkort edited and contributed to the chapbook Creekside, published by Berkeley Poetry Review, where she also served as an editor. Her poetry was featured in the Ishaan Literary Review and has been published in, among other journals, Elsewhere Lit, Menacing Hedge, AGNI, Stirring, and Rogue Agent. She works as an accountant for film and television and is currently producing a documentary on global traditions of prayer. (updated 10/2017)
Jennifer Givhan, a Mexican-American and Indigenous writer from the Southwestern desert, is the author of five poetry collections and three novels, most recently the novel River Woman, River Demon (Blackstone Publishing, 2022), which received a Silver Medal in the International Latino Book Award’s Rudolfo Anaya Latino-Focused Fiction category and was chosen for Amazon’s Book Club and the U.S. Together We Read Book Club. Her work has also appeared in The New Republic, AGNI, The Nation, Poetry, TriQuarterly, and elsewhere. The recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and PEN/Rosenthal Emerging Voices, Givhan is the 2023 Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at The University of New Mexico and lives in Albuquerque with her family. (updated 04/2024)