Crimson
by Fiona Martinez
In the morning, I cross the throttling freeway by bridge.
I walk toward school, unwrapping my gum stick
and, while chewing, wield the sun
in the silver wrapper, searing the eyes
of the cop driving by, who crashes “america’s finest” force car
into the cement underpass.
On campus, I find the still body of a hummingbird
whose crimson chest collided with the crystalline
glass of the president’s office.
I sever the beak and with stone, sharpen
a spear. I etch the window
with their namable atrocities
and for the rest, send her form piercing
through the breast pocket of his suit.
During my lecture on Two-Spirit identities,
a student scrolls on his phone.
I pack the class into a bus and we take each strange
forgotten turn to the desert penitentiary gate. We see
what we aren’t supposed to see.
Our hearts set the pace as we pound bucket drums
to tell the prisoners there are loved ones here.
The faint slide of a once familiar hand, severed
by the courtyard fence, waves.
By sunset, the slip of america
is so thin
it’s safer to divert the eyes.
In downtown la jolla, a man is eye fucking a matte-grey tesla
pupils shining with the cool white of the showcase room.
He maneuvers his phone to get a picture without glare
as I walk around him.
Just as I’m getting home,
a gunman runs through the canyon.
Helicopters flock and find just what they intend.
As the marine layer rolls in,
a woman sitting in traffic
won’t stop singing
I can’t get enough of you
loud and full from her ruby throat,
her voice pressing pulse into the city.
Night is the red reflection of day,
hummingbird feather and vocal chord,
drum thrum and glint of gum.
The revolution keeps me awake,
beating with the perennial rage of poppies
grown by my mother’s tender hand
until they are tall enough to meet the eye.
Fiona Martinez
Fiona Martinez is a queer poet and community organizer from Boise, Idaho and a current MFA writing student at UC San Diego. Often writing while walking, her hybrid work centers nature, water, home (as place and embodiment), and the persistent entanglement of violence and tenderness.