A girl got her appendix taken out
and I wonder what they’ll find
when they cleave me open at the end.
Half the moon, a second heart, and nothing
to cut out. Half the moon because, one time
before I could say they’ve gotta quit that
regarding a car wash dressed
like a theme park, it rolled down
an overpass and into my mouth.
A girl got her appendix taken out
and I buy a pumpkin spice latte for a movie about war,
what my doctor says at least I’m not at.
Fortunate Son fills the room when she leaves
to get me drugs out of her car
because she is fighting the system and that’s great,
but I am fighting for a body
to know it is still good,
and I stopped swallowing tissues.
If I am soft when they cleave me open at the end,
it will be from light that latched and stayed,
wet with the blood of all the living I did.
A Cabrera's poetry, fiction and essays have appeared in The New Guard, Brain,Child Magazine, Colere, Acentos Review, The Berkeley Fiction Review, Best Travelers' Tales 2021 Anthology, Mer, Deronda, and other journals. Her short fiction has been nominated for a Pushcart Award and adapted for stage by the Bay Area Word for Word Theater Company. She writes, teaches, dances and ride bikes in San Francisco, but not always in that order.
Liv Campbell writes poetry from her home state of Texas. She received her BFA from the University of Evansville, where she acted in plays and read her poetry in the basement at open mics. Her work can be found or is forthcoming in Filter Coffee Zine and Does It Have Pockets.