four seasons of life

presented in perfect stones

carved straight from this state

ancient peoples thrived

for white men to steal their land

decade to decade

changing roles today

as we cross state lines; drivers;

New Mexico calls

art, jewelry, friendship

found in plazas, museums,

hot tubs, and shopping

perfect getaway

for some girl-chosen desserts

hard-won and deserved

last threeski spring date

to begin our spring break fun

twenty-mile win

sprucing up for spring

waiting for fresh buds to sprout

and bring back life’s color

we march for our lives

before the gun lobby wins

(their wins are our deaths)

we march with our feet

with our signs, with our family,

with our pens–ready.

we march for our kids

for our schools, teachers, students

for our future lives.

Love is in their faces, their projects, their need to share a piece of themselves. It is not in a test score, a school rating, a bad evaluation.

It is in this injera, moist and spongy, ready to soak up spices that I can’t quite identify. It is in this honey bread, sesame-topped, filled with cream cheese, soft and just made by a mother who embraced me with a hug all the way from Libya and a son who wouldn’t complete a project for the entire year until this one. It is in this tiny girl, now grown, whose quiet presence in my classroom for four years has blossomed with bright colors today as she wears her Karen “I’m-single” shirt and makes a plate to share the Burmese food with her next teacher.

It is in these voices that have found themselves connected by similar foods, colors as bright as their souls, and conflicts that they can only hope they’ll learn to leave behind. It is in the sentences that they have struggled to write in English, in the lyrics from their home countries they proudly play for our party , in the laughter and shared plates as they explain each other’s recipes with one pinch of language mixed with another.

Love is in their commute across two cities on three buses carrying trays as big as their hearts–noodles and rice, tacos and injera, fufu and couscous, immigrant and American. It is in their education–of how to navigate the city, how to navigate the school system, how to navigate a society that simultaneously persecutes and promotes them. It is in their hands, the same hands that shaped these samosas and try to learn to write a Roman alphabet, the hands that clap for each other and figure out how to type and balance a soccer ball and are open to the world around them.

It is in this day, this crazy Friday-before-spring-break day, when they share the world that is our classroom with their whole souls.

Love is here, in their faces. Their foods. Their projects.

In us. Open your eyes. Let me help you find the love.

Monday’s frost melted

by rays of a new season

ready for blue skies

moguls mauled my day

blue sky gave in to snow clouds

as the storm moved in

St. Patrick’s Day bar

with a shade of greenery

here for the first time