I have an aversion to oranges after a bout of the stomach flu in 2015
and it feels like a betrayal to my Floridian roots
So I want to write a poem about my birthplace,
about the sunshine state that should more aptly be called
the often-sunshine, sometimes-thunderstorm state
It is the place where I first learned what it meant to live wildly
Where I’d stingray-shuffle into the blue-green waters,
seaweed playing tricks on my senses as it snaked around my ankles
Where I’d walk barefoot through the grass,
the sand,
across the pavement
Shoes always seemed like an unnecessary barrier between the ground and me
Where I learned to zig-zag run away from alligators,
screen my swimming pool from alligators,
call animal control on alligators
It is the place where concrete low-rises are plastered in muted pastels
and adorned by seashell yards and hurricane shutters
Where classrooms are modified trailer homes
and school hallways bare-***** metal roofs,
providing only a feeble illusion of protection from the elements
But what is rain to a swamp woman?—
She who dances with the manatees and mermaids in Weeki Wachee
She who runs away from home on a bicycle with handlebar tassels
She who cries the first time she catches a fish and does not release it
She who is unafraid of getting wet
There, everything is citrus and salt
and the thick, humid air holds my bones together with more ardor
than any northern wind could imagine
I fold my nostalgia into neat compartments
and wrap it in a bow that says, “I do not miss this”
But still, I cannot deny the spellbinding yellow cables of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge—
over which, as we would drive, I’d hold my breath until I turned bluer than the sky and sea around me,
wondering if we’d make it across in time
These fragments, all once mere mundanities of my childhood,
have since become ingrained in my individual
So, when people ask me where I’m from and my tongue forgets your name—
know that I am forever freckled with your memory