Ozone
Luisa Caycedo-Kimura

Clouds come, as they do. Water molecules, salt, dust.
Warm air over cold.

* * *

Like troglobites, we live in the darkest parts of caves,
forget flowers exist, that rainbows appear after showers.

* * *

Troy, from two doors down, sells hash in the parking lot.
His gun goes off; we move our bed to the living room.

* * *

The clouds come. The stratus wraps us in grayness.
Thunder ones weigh on our chest.

* * *

Mamá always said, Lloviendo y haciendo sol,
son las gracias del señor. But we can’t feel
God’s grace. Like mole people,
we hide from light.

* * *

Today he says his painting sucks, and I know
he’s tired of moving. Another apartment,
another box. It isn’t wanderlust.
A sense of gain or loss perhaps.

* * *

In fifteen years, I’ve grown accustomed to his snores.
If I don’t hear him, I check his pulse.

* * *

We follow routines, celebrate everything:
publications, library cards, when the ice melts, the snow.

* * *

This morning the clouds surround us, like sheets the nurses tuck.
We kick our feet. Lie in our caves.

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