Sofia Ortiz, Crouch, 2020 (Artist Website)
Watercolor on paper, 31 x 41 cm
of touch the unhygienic
warmth the apartness the brutal
closeness of hair rough and cropped
when she could no longer leave her bed
petaled skin felt the breath
the breach of others, each time she's turned
it hurts and each time she's not turned
bones find their way through
her yielding body just as acorns scatter
beyond tree's crown refusing
to be isolated from their earth
in this ache which feels like longing
on a dry mountainside a turtle
endures in oleander shade
jaw snapped shut
then she a tiny bird
whose throat pulse trembles bravely
withgrains of food on the lips
box closed and open, body sewn
and unseamed, oceanic, the wings
the unhurried wings of pelicans
unfurl over the immaculate
mud of wetlands, the carbon
of future earths