Frontera 

I give you my borders—the shrinking edges of curls and canela

The places where my sand gives into your snow La frontera

de mi alma—estrella y espacio a muddled damask

of olive and alabaster I give you my fingertips and the curve

of my back The frontiers of this body

where lines run together—turning poetry to prose

I give you the husk in my throat and my tongue

stumbling over the syllables we are learning together

The azafran arches and powdered-sugar palms

The parts of me that hide in plain sight

We are dulce that melts on warm lips in

February frigid—I am not summer and you are not fall

somewhere we meet in between

like ice crystals falling in a desert night.

love poem for the Puerto Rican

this is a puerto rican love poem

full of cariño and vaporub

and too loud whispering

the puerto rican love

poem is full of parcha or chinola or

maracuya whatever you want to call it

a cut fruit love language learned from

brusque ladies who say hay

comida instead of acrid apologies that

ajonjoli stick in their throats

bellyful of unlearning

quieting

the underside rumbling

this puerto rican love poem breaks

generational curses

gives

second chances says

i’m sorry says

i love you  says

we’ll work through this.

this puerto rican love poem is salsa

dancing on 1 instead of 2

soldiering on like a little young lord

against an unbeatable foe

the puerto rican love poem    loves hard

hard like machete blade eviscerating

coconut meat.