If the moon were our child
cradled in the sky, then you and I
would be fish swimming in its milky rivers,
jumping upstream to count
the freckles on its nose. How high
would you jump, how many years
would you swallow to hear the rhythms
of its orbit? Tell me again
the colors you found
inside my body, how you tasted
them, how you rubbed
them on your face like war paint
and looked our fathers in the eye.
Tell me how you took my pallet
into your hands and fed the world
your creation. As a girl,
my mother caught mayates and tied
their legs to a string
as if their little, metallic green bodies
could belong to her. Nothing
in this earth is ours, and everything is.
Wendy Silva is a queer, Latinx poet from the central coast of California. She received her BA from UC Riverside in Creative Writing and her MFA in poetry from the University of Idaho. She has been teaching for seven years and is excited about her upcoming transition to a full-time faculty member in the English Department at Riverside City College. She is passionate about equity and social justice. She enjoys brunch, reading graphic novels, and gardening.