The sun is orange, the sky a textureless grey. Haze. It’s hazy. ‘Haze’ is a kinder word than ‘smoke.’ What does a deep breath feel like? When was the last time you had one? The sun turns red, the sky a uniform pink. Tree line looks rubbed with a cheap eraser. Ash floats soft as snow. Will it bury you? Will you ever see light again? All is greyscale. Lay awake. Toss when you finally fall asleep. You may not wake up. Will smoke consume you? Will embers swallow you whole?
Tag: Poetry
There’s always a chance you’re wrong
Each section is based on the Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the day from July, 2021.
I. hen scratch, n.
An omen, they say, crawling across the sky. Hard rain, thunder, lightning will scar our cropland.
II. baksheesh, n., adj., and adv.
To stop the storm, we offer a loaf of bread wrapped in a ceremonial woolen cloth buried beneath an ancient cedar’s roots.
III. zinger, n.
“You actually believe in the burying bread thing?!” my son laughs. “You might as well ask them to make Monday follow Tuesday!” He shakes his head. I sigh. “You’ll understand when the rain calms and the clouds burn away.”
IV. noctambulist, n.
Moon walks behind the layer of blue-black clouds — a bruise across the sky. Stars appear, sprout rays toward the moon, which set clouds ablaze — a sheet of pale flame.
V. astrogator, n.
I point at the clear morning sky. “You see! You see! They took the offering” My hands wave back and forth. “They cleared the storm with the moon’s fire!” “Preposterous. There must be a scientific explanation for all that,” he dismissively shakes his head.
VI. seven-pennyworth, n.
“Look here, right here! An explanation for the storm!” He points to an article in the newspaper. “An abnormal weather pattern brought about by the changing climate. It’s science, Dad.”
VII. amazingness, n.
I scan the article. “Reasonable, I’ll give you that, but you cannot be certain.” Pointing to the final paragraph, “There’s always a chance you’re wrong. It’s science, Son.” I sip my coffee. “The climate, the moon, or the stars — The fact is: the storm is gone.”
VIII. dunger, n.
A quiet drive in my old truck, a Ford whose red paint has faded to the hue of a house finch’s breast. Its motor’s hum, the only sound between my son and me.
IX. okada, n.
The truck hiccups, comes to a complete stop. “Did the moon and stars kill your truck too?” He laughs, pulling out his phone. I pinch my eyebrows. “So what if they did? We’re stuck either way.” He calls a friend who lives nearby, who can get him to the station on their loud motorcycle.
X. krump, v.
I stay with the truck to poke at it, see if I can figure out what the problem is. I turn on the stereo on the seat which I bought after the built-in one broke to find a radio station to help me think. It catches when I try to start it up, and I pop the hood to find something moving around the engine.
XI. odditorium, n.
A bushy tail. Eyes red as arterial blood. Two long claws on each paw. A claw cuts a cable. A hiss through sharp teeth. Two wings unfurl, carry it all away.
XII. seventhly, adv. and n.
Dave arrives to tow me home. “What the hell happened? Leo said your truck just died?” I completely forgot the plan we came up with when we saw Leo only had enough service to text. I can’t keep my voice down. “I don’t know! Did you see that?! Why are there so many omens lately?! “What is happening?!”
XIII. ovulite, n.
Dave cannot draw the connections himself, so I help. I talk about the storm, the stars, the creature in the truck, every weird occurrence around town, how each element fits together like sedimentary rock.
XIV. dogleg, v.
Dave listens as he tows me home, curves around the backroads, nods politely as I talk.
XV. automorphism, n.
It can’t just be me. Everyone must see it too; it’s too obvious. Dave gets it. He doesn’t say so, but he does.
XVI. staycation, n.
“I think the sun might be getting to you,” Dave says as he maneuvers my truck into the driveway. “You might need to rest a while.” His sentence punctuated by the grip of the emergency brake.
XVII. papri, n.
Dave leaves. I pop the hood, the knife of my leatherman unsheathed, ready to strike. Nothing emerges. I find the broken cable, unattach the loose halves. I get Leo’s road bike from the garage, ride it to the AutoZone by the strip mall. Its thin wheels hum in the wind.
XVIII. mandela, n.
The stereo on the counter blares some talk radio voice in the store; its antenna pokes over the register. I pace through the aisles ’til I find a replacement cable, then return to the counter. Ger methodically rings me up, grumbles, “Always namedropping insteada doing anything to change anything.”
XIX. custard pie, n.
Ger holds the cable in his callused hands. “How this happen?” I sigh, “The truck died, and a monster under the hood cut it.” He looks at me, then at the cable, raises an eyebrow, then guffaws. “Musta been one scary squirrel, Harv!”
XX. butin, n.
Not wanting more ridicule, I notice the month with no clouds, but say nothing. At least the storm didn’t destroy our crops.
XXI. buster suit, n.
Midafternoon. Condensation pools around a glass of water on the table. In the waves above the road, I see myself as a child running in the soft rain of early fall.
XXII. star shot, n.
An omen, a message from the stars, hanging from the sitka spruce branches, I say. A common mold, a fungus without meaning or purpose, Leo says, showing me a picture on his phone.
XXIII. olive branch, n.
Lift my cap, scratch my head, “It wouldn’t hurt to leave an offering just in case.” “A loaf feeds us for a week. We can’t afford to waste it.” He rubs his eyes with both hands.
XXIV. rebetika, n.
Midnight — when the moon and stars meet to discuss their plans. Midnight — when crevices and faults open to release demons to our realm. Midnight — when I take our last loaf of bread to bury under the ancient cedar’s roots.
XXV. genteelness, n.
“Dad. What the hell? Where’s the bread?” Leo slams the cabinets shut. I rub my shoulders. “We can get by without it. The offering had to be made.” Before he speaks, I hold up a hand. “Now hold on. Listen. Rain will come and save us and our crops.”
XXVI. roman à clef, n.
I try to read the stars as they appear just after dusk, to see if they’ve listened. Without a cipher, I don’t recognize any of the names they mutter to themselves.
XXVII. unplug, v.
Leo makes breakfast the next morning: coffee, eggs and toast. I stare at the plate. “Where did you get more bread? I thought we couldn’t afford it.” “I dug up that loaf you buried. The soil kept it cool, the cloth kept it clean.” He smiles at his own cleverness. He has no faith in the process, no idea what he’s done.
XXVIII. Henatrice, n.
A hellish caw echoes over our acreage, shakes the window frames. In the sky, a winged beast, feathers and scales and menace in its eyes. It soars over the house toward town, death in its wake.
XXIX. ang moh, n. and adj.
Looking at the window, blood drains from Leo’s face, now pale as calla lilies. “I- I don’t- I don’t understand,” he stammers, wide-eyed, mouth agape.
XXX. Parafango, n.
I get out of my seat. “You took its offering. Now we need to fix it.” I gather all the pieces of the loaf, blend a mixture of wax from a prayer candle, ash from the wood stove. After coating the bread in ashwax, it’s wrapped in a woolen cloth, reburied at the cedar. Shielding my eyes while running back to the house, I hear its caw as it returns.
XXXI. Greeze, n.
“How did you know that would work? It’s nonsensical,” Leo scratches his head, as the beast flies away. I take a deep breath. “It’s drawn to the ash and wax, something the elders said worked long ago.” “That’s all superstition though! That’s not scientific at all!” He grips the hair above his temples. I put a hand on his shoulder. “Science isn’t an answer; it’s a question.”
A Calm Lake
Stillness permeated from the lake. Trees stood still, branches stoic in the wind. Actually, it felt like wind died as it approached the lake, or maybe all the molecules found their spaces to be. No evidence of animal life anywhere — no tracks nor droppings or food. Not even insect bites on leaves. You’re sure the ecosystem ought to be suffering, but it’s lush and green.
Ali Shuffle; Or, When We Met
At the edge of the forest, I saw a madrone bent by ancient winds and remembered the way you danced at the festival by the palace when we met. I wondered what you were doing — whether you were serving tourists in your family’s tavern — whether you missed me. When we made camp that night, the firelight shimmered on cedar trunks, and I saw your hair reflecting in the sunset again. When we threw a fir branch on as it got dark, its pines popped so quick— like your feet when the beat picked up— like my heart when I saw you.
This poem is part of a collection called Shards of Kardpaz, which are texts I’ve written for the world of the Dungeons & Dragons campaigns I run with students at my school.
Padkos; Or, You left so suddenly
I hope you’re alright. You left so suddenly — you needed to go somewhere to save something — it’s what adventurers do. I know that; I’ve worked in this tavern my whole life. I hope you’re not hurt. News came in from a scout that a chasm opened along the trail south, where you said you were going. They said they found a modest grave a couple yards off the pathway near it. Before you left, I got up early, split our family’s culture, kneaded it into some dough, let it rise. I sang songs to it from my family — stories of tavernkeeps from long past — and from my favorite local bard who can never settle on a name — songs of decaying drow corpses and sacrificing souls to Nerull — before baking it in my family’s hearth as old as the grove itself. I snuck it into your pack before you woke up, so that maybe when things got dire, you might find a second wind and be able to ride it back to me.
This poem is part of a collection called Shards of Kardpaz, which are texts I’ve written for the world of the Dungeons & Dragons campaigns I run with students at my school.
During a Heatwave
You step out into the yard, feel the heat’s weight descend on you. The grass is warm, dry between your toes. You think about how the only way for an individual to escape the effects of climate change is to add to it — a never-ending cycle that you may not live to see humanity escape. You check the weather app every five minutes to see if all of this is even real. You try to read a book on the couch, feel the heat seep in through a gap in the caulking of the window, fight the temptation to sleep. You try to think about cold things, because it worked for Gus in that one episode of Recess you watched as a kid; it does not work for you here. You imagine what you would do if the power went out, whether you would secure what cold you’ve collected inside, run away, or just lie down and wait for the sun to consume you. Ninety-three degrees in your apartment at 10 pm. You scramble to turn on and adjust every fan inside. You cannot find any air.
at what cost
click enter on your search — an electric impulse through an algorithm spanning an incomprehensible index, maintained in server farms across the globe — scroll through results — the first ones the most profitable for the engine’s parent company, the second ones bought by other companies — on your phone — put together by child labor in Asia from materials mined by forced labor in Africa — to view a content — for which the creator makes fractions of a cent, if they are compensated at all — which will vanish into the ether — as soon as you close the tab or open a new one.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.
A poem by a white man in his thirties with undiagnosed depression— undiagnosed because he’s afraid of seeing a therapist and discovering that problems are deeper, more destructive than he thinks they are— who works through his feelings and insecurities in his writing; who buries himself in work because it’s the only coping mechanism he knows for quieting the spiral inside his head; who puts the needs of other people ahead of himself, telling himself it’s the polite thing to do, when really he believes he is not worthy of the time, effort, and support everyone else is.
You’re Old Now
You realize it when the belt you’ve worn for a decade breaks — the buckle torn through the thin, separated layers. You sigh, lament the trip to Target you’ll have to make to buy a new one before asking yourself why you need one anyway. Because men wear belts? Because your eighth-grade history teacher humiliated one of your classmates who didn’t wear one? Because you always have? Have you just been stuck in a pattern— recessive, repetitive — this whole time? Are you just a shipping container carried by someone else’s freight train?
On a bench by a pond
Something about wet two-by-fours feels like home. Xe sits on a bench, wet from morning dew and mist, on a boardwalk overlooking a pond. Two mallards paddle in front of xem— a slow game of tag or awkward flirting, xe isn’t sure. Soft croaks from red-legged frogs emanate from the kinnikinnik covering the ground. Xe could breathe here.
M. Espinosa 