Tracing the Horse

Diana Marie Delgado is the author of the chapbook Late Night Talks with Men I Think I Trust (Center for Book Arts, 2015)

she currently resides in Tucson where she is the Literary Director of the Poetry Center at the University of Arizona. She holds MFA degrees in poetry from both Columbia University and the University of California, Riverside.

Macho, our dog,

used to curl up

on the patio

and yawn.

California has a lot of prisons, all with beautiful names.

Amiga

We were in front of Kmart when I called your boyfriend an asshole for beating you up and you told me if I said anything bad about him again, you’d never speak to me.

Never Mind I’m Dead

Come back with me

Who keeps

the stars

from falling

out of the sky?

This is the only place that’s ever felt like home. I hope you get this letter

before lights out … or have you learned to read in the dark

I’m on the couch, reading The Stand

when he walks in after stealing

a woman’s purse.

Our house: two doors,

a window that never opens.