Love Letters for the Itinerant

Love Letters for the Itinerant
Lisa M. Bradley

Flood-swollen
the atlas burst
like an accordion
once it docked
on dry land.
You took a pocket knife
slashed some keys and
kirigami
presented me
a mildewed compass rose.
It brimmed my cupped hands
frutescent with meridians
the layers of latitude and longitude
dense as peony petals.
If railroads didn't exist
I'd lay down tracks
of twig and broken bone
I'd ladder hills and valleys
with my ribs
to get to you.
When I ran out of rungs
I'd reach back
naked lungs heaving
and re-cast those bones
tread them to spindrift, or until
papel picado
your signal swept through the trees
and I ran aground on your doorstep.

Lisa M. Bradley grew up in South Texas, before the construction of the Border Wall. She writes about boundaries and those who defy them in works ranging from haiku to novels. Her poetry and prose have appeared in numerous venues, including Strange Horizons, Cicada, and The Moment of Change: An Anthology of Feminist Speculative Poetry. She blogs about Latin@ representation in media, mental health issues, and horror across genres at cafenowhere.livejournal.com. She also tweets and tumbles as cafenowhere.