Category: poetry

By Edcel Javier Cintron Gonzalez

Sometimes, my stomach rumblies send me a notification / a sensation where I’m unsure if my body will act in motion / with what my mind is feeling at the moment / and my own relationship with food from past, present, and future enrollment / as I try and try again my best to finish this doctorate degree / and how my eating has adapted the same behavior as my stress / an embodied sensation I wish I didn’t had / for sometimes, my stomach rumblies whisper to me a faint sound / a slight vibration where I am unsure of my hunger / my need for food / my desire to enjoy a taste meal / as I try to mentally prepare my own self and my hungry self for another day in school / a brave face that I wear as a mask / to not show my vulnerability towards other / the second hand embarrassment I would feel if people knew the state of my own sanity / and if they would
believe my lived experience or take it as my own exaggeration / for POC stories are set aside and thrown in the trash / as how my stomach, sometimes makes the rumblies when I feel tired / when I feel sick of eating food I love / where the taste of it is no longer there / where my nostalgia for local food from my homeland calls on me as the second coming of frozen / as the ocean calls on their islander children to come back home…

By Edcel Javier Cintron-Gonzalez

Hey Muse, One Muse, When can I rest, my Muse? / We are live streaming in a temporary space /where my muse visits me in my dreams / placing my body to rest after a long day of stress / a space where my body wishes to dream a long sleep / midday in the scene / a sensation some may describe as a nap while others / a moment of rest / where my mental state is covered in tamarind flavored ice cream / the one you can only get in the island of enchantment / where coconuts and passion fruit fuse together / to form vivid dreamsicles in your taste buds / where your mind drifts away to the illuminating beaches found in all directions around the island / a space in a vivid dream where islanders dream in two languages / a narrative, no… a memory / disguised as my childhood nostalgia / a moment where my Muse guides me in my first memory with my language learning / one language where your first words were about love, heritage, and kindness / when my mom picked me up in her arms and said “te amo Javi” / I learned to say it back “te amo mama” / where my Spanish was a secret language / only spoken at the safety of home / around the love and support of the community / as a way to calm down my fears in the face of natural destruction / in the face of swirling giants who took our home / my temporary space / my childhood… / the other language taught my five year old self / hope, friendship and success / as I gained friends who could speak my new language / as I gained acknowledgement for my almost native tongue / not the ones that sound like you are forcing the language to leave your body / where I become a walking Google translator in our family trips to Disney / where at the beginning, I thought my English came with the same care as my Spanish / younger me did not understand why the security guard stalked my mother and I for speaking our home language / younger me did not understand why people smiled at my pale skin / complemented my accent as it were a cloak of invisibility / a green flag to let them know I’m not a threat… hey Muse, one Muse… when can I dream in both languages, Muse?

By Benjamin Rodriguez

I’m dying, not because my brain has ceased all explosive, obligatory function
reducing me to a vegetative state, rotting on the vine
my mother holds, keeping me there
only she remembers my nonbeing being connected to her
once and every so often, it feels all the same

my eyes are smashed in, bruised, “Who hurt you”, which is never a question I
can answer without opening a book, checking my phone, drinking coffee with a single
espresso shot to just keep me aware enough of what I am saying

sobriety is something I took for granted as I am easily addicted, hooked, and devastated
I am dying because the caffeine I ingest is refusing to touch my heart again

By Benjamin Rodriguez

you, you, you
are a revolving door of compliments
sunken in the Sahara, no chance,
Meaning: Possibilities are undefined
but you exist to serve the sand, grain-bearer

Stop-Starting, not beginning you mouth,
A gaping coral reef before this sentence
was translated to thoughts, to feelings
materializing nonsense kept in brimstone,
your certainty, and I quote whatever, whenever that will come to me,
“I am well-versed, eroded
The Rosetta stone for those
Illiterate, confused
That break before me”
End your sentences sooner, they’re sensitive
to caffeine and your medicine that dries your scalp
or, perhaps there is nothing left in your head
to bring about more strands of spaghetti’d knowledge

By Maggie McHale

Illusions of misery,

cascade the shelves of my mind.

Delicately, I intertwined another thread of this mysterious existence,

hoping she brings me petals on Sunday.

By Maggie McHale

counting along the lines,

none forgotten, none erased

followed by another number

Counting Cups,

what a disgrace.

By Maggie McHale

The tree stands for more than life.

For strength, and trials, and all the strife.