Back to Issue Twenty-Four.

diary entry #14: navigating

BY DIANNELY ANTIGUA

 

This is how I do things:
control my cravings, hide in store alcoves,

become undesirable. Once I’m pregnant,
how will I justify wearing

what happened as a child. I want to
escape what the rain reminds me of—

wet pill, black dress, the night I
dragged my own paradise. My mother

misses me, wishes she could rock me to sleep. I
didn’t go to Spain,

though Calle Pureza is all I have left.
I took the metro to the cinema, another date

without his tongue as the center. In my nightmare,
he is moaning in my ear. I tell myself

I would do a lot of things
if only I were asked. To share

my bed with one person
I wouldn’t have to pack my bags

with toilet paper and soap. I remember when
noise would bother me—

a father with crying babies,
a watered-down sweet.

 

Diannely Antigua is a Dominican American poet and educator, born and raised in Massachusetts. She is currently an MFA candidate and Global Research Initiative Fellow at New York University, a Squaw Valley Community of Writers Fellow, and Associate Poetry Editor for BOAAT. Her collection, Ugly Music, was chosen for the 2017 Pamet River Prize, and is forthcoming from YesYes Books. Her work has been nominated for both the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, and can be found in Day One, Vinyl, Split Lip Magazine, Cosmonauts Avenue, Tinderbox, and elsewhere. Her heart is in Brooklyn.

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