Walk through the park.
Sunday afternoon.
Lie on the grass.
Close your eyes.
Feel the sun on your face—
soft, warm.
Listen to the world breathe.
Walk to your car.
Almost midnight.
Shove your name tag in your pocket.
Close your eyes.
Feel the blood pulse through your head.
Lie on sidewalk—
soft, cool.
Listen to the world cry.
Walk down the street.
Rainy afternoon.
Keep your hands in your pockets.
Keep your head down.
Sit on the curb.
Look at your shoes.
Close your eyes.
Feel the rain—
soft, comforting.
Listen to the world dream.
Walk down a trail.
By a river.
Step up to it.
Look at yourself.
Step into the river.
Sit in its bed.
Close your eyes.
Feel the water—
soft, passing.
Listen to the world die.
Category: Poetry
On Age and Perspective
You are enclosed. All is black, cramped. You see, you know nothing. You are born. New light, shapes, colors blind you. You reject them— screaming, crying. You are swaddled. Differentiated colors spiral into fuzz a foot away. You care not for anything save food and sleep. You are young. You recognize cities and names, their stains and hues homogenous: paved roads, smiling people. You are adolescent. Countries take shape; shores erode to swerving waves, become individual. Somewhere, someone cries by a broken-down car on a dirt road. You are grown. You see the forest for the trees, landmasses for the countries, ocean for the seas— the world. You see the earth circle the sun, harmonious and even— comforting predictability in its neighborhood. You are old. You see the solar system fade into a galaxy into black tapestry. You breathe nebulas, bathe in chaos. You live on the edge of the universe.
Meditations on Driving
You were driving,
and I was sitting next to you
in the passenger seat
of your late-80s Tercel.
I sat,
slouched,
my forehead on the cold glass of the window.
I saw the white lines on the road,
bright from your headlights,
and I thought of long, thick lines of cocaine.
Because that
is a simile I would put in a poem
when I was in high school,
a line that I would feel proud of,
I smiled.
– – –
He was driving
his company truck
across Oregon
for the fourth straight hour.
The seats were covered
with old day-planner pages and safety forms,
empty sunflower seed bags and
leftover fast-food napkins.
Wind screamed through the open window
over his music—
the bass up,
doorframes buzzing—
while his hand sailed in the sun.
He steered with his knee,
his hands off the wheel
to open a water bottle and drink.
He told me bad jokes
about drinking and driving,
described obscure landmarks
like family members at a reunion.
He memorized mileposts and exit signs,
infused them in his veins.
– – –
She was driving
me back from a doctor appointment.
The radio was off;
the car filled with the engine’s drone,
rain drumming on the roof,
the wipers keeping time.
I looked at the streetlights
reflected in the puddles
on the side of the road—
and if you do,
you see the actual shape of the filament
instead of the light it projects.
She asked me
what I was thinking,
what I was feeling.
I didn’t know what to say,
so I didn’t
say anything.
– – –
I was driving
home
from the school where I work
two hours after my contractual day ended.
I was on the highway
headed east
on 18 toward Snoqualmie.
I looked at the lines on the road,
the dashes,
the clouds above.
The exit sign glimmered in the October twilight—
wet pine needles stuck on its face.
I saw the off-ramp,
thought
about missing it,
not coming back,
starting anew
anywhere else.
My foot hovered over the gas pedal—
I took the exit.
You want to be a teacher.
You want to be a teacher. Maybe you had a great math teacher in middle school; maybe you had an awful history teacher in high school. It doesn’t really matter— you decide to go to college. You struggle with the idea that there is a singular source of information, that there is a singular way to learn or master a skill. You get a piece of paper signed by a man you’ll never meet that says you are a competent educator. You sub in a couple school districts. You call it “gigging” to make it feel more temporary, impermanent— a low tide at dawn. Your lesson ideas come like meteor showers— somewhat predictably, all at once. You put them in a folder on your MacBook called “One Day.” You get an interview. They ask you: “Why do you want to teach language arts at Rainier Middle School?” You want a job. You get hired in the middle of the school year. You adopt the building’s rules, their calendar, their lessons. The next year, an idea grabs you, won’t let go. You deviate from the calendar, tell no one. Your students get excited. Your students get engaged. Your students show you YouTube videos they found because of you. You get a new administrator. He demands fidelity to a curriculum he never used; one he knows next to nothing about. You feel walls sprout from the ground around you. You try to become a leader. You run a program only to see everything you built get thrown away. You apply to another position only to get turned down by building and district administrators. He talks to you like you don’t know how to teach. Your district liaison talks to you like you don’t know how to teach. Your new program head talks to you like you don’t know how to teach. Maybe you don’t know how to teach. There is a good five minutes between when you arrive in your parking spot and when you exit your car where you sit and breathe. You don’t know what you want.
Snow Remembering December
First, there was the fall.
I was floating at the base of a maple. It was cold. Through the sky’s slow blinking, the leaves changed, shriveled, dove. The puddle rippled as they landed, sent small waves to the forest shore. Gaps revealed a wide, grey tent propped up by tree limbs.
Then, there was the fall.
I was floating on a current over some town, small buildings hastily decorated with a single strand of multicolored lights. I saw people walking around with overstuffed bags. Small steam clouds came out of their mouths, trying desperately to return home. I saw them rise, slowly, wistfully, taking the scenic route here and there, as I felt a chill run up my spine. My limbs stiffened, and I started my slow, swirling descent.
Last, there was the fall.
I was lying on the slope of a hill by a building. There was a hemlock there, sleds propped up on its trunk. The sun peeked out from a tear in the canvas, and I felt warm. I felt my arms loosen, my legs stretch. I rested my back on a blade of grass and looked up into the hemlock’s branches; its small needles trying to stitch the sky. The grass bent under my weight and sent me sliding to the soft earth. Curled up, I pulled the covers over my head and slept.
M. Espinosa 