MY ARRANGEMENT

 

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His hola!

sounds so perfunctory

so why should I 

pay it any attention.

 

I tell him I’m busy

not that I’m pregnant.

I have flowers to arrange.

 

For someone 

who’s barely 

set foot in a garden,

I’m getting good at this.

 

My stomach 

may pull me out of shape

but my roses are 

perfectly bunched. 

 

Someone will give these

as a gift of love.

There is no such name

for what he gave me.

 

He comes by the store every day

but eventually I’ll grow so big,

I’ll become invisible.

 

Just a ramera

with a child that could be anyone’s.

 

I have been foolish.

He’s been like his hola! –

a greeting

that can’t say goodbye enough.

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Juanita Rey is a Dominican poet who has been in this country five years. Her work has been published in Pennsylvania English, Opiate Journal, Petrichor Machine, and Porter Gulch Review.

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