ello, jello

I have these ridges on my toenails, I guess they’re called Beau’s lines

Like rings of a tree trunk, they tell my most recent story

The way you shook painfully in my arms on our very last night, the same one the presidential apocalypse began

You kissed my forehead goodbye the next morning and I drove from your grandma’s house amongst the evergreens to my parents house, deep in the desert

I never walked barefoot in Washington, didn’t like the sliminess of the moist earth, was wary of splinters after the first few

Maybe I was scared of planting roots up north, because here I plunge into our alpine lake and dig myself ankle-deep into the sand