To whom / What I bow
for the ones who hold the line
i bow to what keeps the body from collapsing not the monument the maintenance i bow to the hands that never enter the photograph the farmworker bent into rows before light strawberries staining the cuticle soil under the nail - alfalfa / clay / irrigation water the honey bee - feral mathematician - mapping sweetness across distances we will never walk carrying pollen like a quiet contract her colony thinning under neonicotinoid rain the plumber under the house face in the damp dark learning the language of blockage / pressure / release copper / rust / slow leak / the smell of old solder the woman on night shift folding linens hospital corners tight enough to hold a life in place bleach / heat / repetition vending machine coffee at 4 a.m. the ache in her lower back she does not name the line cook at 2 a.m. - oil burn on the forearm the mother who washes the same shirt into its twentieth year the person who drives the truck at 3 a.m. keeping oranges moving across state lines keeping milk from turning diesel / thermos coffee / long road the elotero pushing the cart up the hill in August chile / lime / cotija who took the paper food stamps when nobody else would the bell he rings without needing to be told why i bow to the root systems that hold the hill together when the rain comes sideways oak / manzanita / wild grasses gripping the slope to mycelium - trading sugar / warning / memory beneath us to the barn owl thinning the rodents in silence to the turkey vulture cleaning what we cannot bear to see to the dog who keeps watch at the door we do not lock i bow to the fog drip on the redwood to the rain that returns to the wind that pollinates what the bees no longer can i bow to the ones who fix what we never see break wires pipes roads at their softest points i bow to the overlooked labor of repair the auntie who feeds everyone before she sits the one who remembers who cannot eat salt the grandmother boiling bones into broth the midwife with cracked hands and a low voice i bow to the dead who hold us up to the composting forest floor to the ancestors whose names we lost and the ones we never knew to ask i bow to grief that keeps showing up anyway to breath that returns even when unwanted i bow to what continues without applause







Words that feel the cracks.
Name the architecture.
Like Pretty Thunder.
Thank you, as always 🙏
Yes, Iya. This prayer, this word. Needed.🌪💕🌀✨️💖