The Nelligan Review

Grandmother, in what gray glazed cloud does your heart rest? Sometimes I think I hear your voice rustle from the shoulders of a blue-tailed lizard, or perhaps, in the swaying frail tips of sagebrush surviving summer. In this departing hour, a silver horizon falls beneath my feet and I wish I’d become a fading lunar eclipse. Perhaps then, I’d stop dreaming of black scorpions crawling out of the mouths of French philosophers. Perhaps then, the dream where rain drizzles sharp pineapple rinds, and redwood trees wear a thousand bovine eyes, would end. Grandmother, resurrect your spirit-healing hands and cure me by smearing rubbing alcohol and spearmint leaves on my skin. I want to know I am still your child and ask it so because I want the Morelia marigolds to know. I want the mossy stone blocks of Tzintzuntzan to know. I want Mictlantecuhtli and Tezcatlipoca to know. Today, I thought I heard your voice blow in from a southern current and billow into idyllic winds heading toward the sun, but it was a green-winged hummingbird fluttering above.