Staring out a 10th floor window onto a city
I could never afford to be from again
In downtown LA, I find shelter in your chest.
From mouthfucking on Monday night,
to the penultimate look you gave me Saturday
moorning, as the haze in the early-May
sky begins to lift. We had to return to
the places that houses our traces.
Have you been alienated by your labor?
Your body pressed against and
behind me; your breasts sashay to meet
the swagger in the small of my back,
your breath on my neck; as your mouth cruises
the boulevard of my earlobes.
Ay, ███.
Ay, ███
And your name, a record
made illegible
in its intended Castellano
Image Credits: femme run
raquel gutiérrez writes personal essays, memoir, art criticism, and poetry. A child of Mexican and Salvadoran immigrants, raquel was born and raised in Los Angeles and currently lives in Tucson, Arizona. She/they completed MFAs in Poetry and Non-Fiction from the University of Arizona. raquel runs the tiny press, Econo Textual Objects, which publishes works by QTPOC poets. Her/their poetry and essays have appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Open Space, and elsewhere. Her/their first book, Brown Neon (Coffee House Press), will be published in the Spring 2021 and her/their first book of poetry, Southwest Reconstruction (Noemi Press), will be published in 2022.
