Adaptation

Jennifer Lagier

“IamthechildIeverwas,IamthemanImeanttobe.IamtrulyFortune’scookie.” ~MarkLangton

I am a flatland, peach ranch refugee, relocated to curved, peninsula dunes, restored missions, commercial fishing boats, sea lion laden piers, oceanic lagoons.

Back in Escalon, I raised sweet corn, tomatoes, melons, and squash. On Marina shores, brisk wind wilts roses, snaps fragile foxgloves. Weather is cold, water rationed.

Acreage is expensive, unattainable, tiny houses packed cheek to jowl. Twisted cypress cling to jagged coastline. Pets snarl at raccoons and deer.

Each day, I revel in rafts of sleeping otters, somersaulting dolphins, wise-cracking gulls. Transplanted roots sink deep, keep me stable. Friendships, poetry blossom; this is my home.

Odalis

Odalis Guillen

Butchered pronunciations serve as a reminder of my foreign identity

My name does not roll off of the Caucasian tongue

Instead, the consonants and vowels take complicated routes, Wrong turns