the only ode to rockford
sweet lover rats
crawled into the boxy
hole in my wall
stained with some paper
of a previous homeowner—
box-owner
i think of you fondly
and that slanted ceiling
on the top floor
and—forgive me for the mess
we just moved in;
now, in the warm quiet
of this college-town,
i learn to hear your
gunshots like
lovers’ groans and wear your
bullet holes like
beauty spots
you totaled me a little too ‘good’;
i’m soft and white
in all the wrong spots
i’m the last exasperated gulp
that’ll ever escape you—
dug those pudgy fingers
down your throat to
finally expel me out to
the whispers i’ll
claim to some
shootout at the mall that
spill giggles from my lips
though, still,
i wince at cars
with tinted windows
passing by
my brother has me as
‘lil spic’ in his phone;
drawls and clangs remind
me of home.
talks with Mamí:
sis off probation,
baby nephews got into that gifted program—
same one like me,
Orion bought that house
and—
“¿me prestas cien pesos, hijita?” (he’ll pay it back on friday—with some extra)
screw city lived up to its name
i scraped my knee ten times over,
you’re the bruise
that’s all green now—
i came back knowing that
i’m not all poignant,
i’m you, too.
Giulyana Gamero is a senior communication major at SUNY Geneseo and the former Youth Poet for the city of Rockford. She loves to take on artistic projects in any medium, such as 89.3 WGSU’s Sunflower Story Hour, a paranormal audio drama. Her writing has appeared in Gandy Dancer issues 13.1 and 14.1, The Lamron, and in Carnegie Hall’s Traveling the Spaceways. Her visual art has appeared at the Rockford Art Museum and Bridgeport Art Center.