I have crossed 
without looking 
many times nothing
hit me this morning 
I hummed along 
with the engine
in the train caught
myself before I
got too loud 
now: later
riding in reverse 
the sun still 
shines through
dirt on the windows
still springs back 
from the glass
like mirror or 
blade in my head 
I love mixed 
metaphors
I brew blade glass
metal and water
in my head 
I can’t 
hear myself in accent 
I can’t
tell the difference
morning | mourning
luto | luto 
I turn 
my concoction 
into fragrance
perfume | perfume
both
same 
speed each 
up its own 
little nostril
they smell 
like clean knife
they smell 
like nothing
like dead
sunshine
through glass

Published February 7th, 2021

Ananda Lima’s poetry collection Mother/land (Black Lawrence Press, forthcoming in 2021) won the 2020 Hudson Prize. She is also the author of the chapbooks Translation (Paper Nautilus, 2019, winner of the Vella Chapbook Prize), Amblyopia (Bull City Press - INCH Series, 2020), and Tropicália (Newfound, forthcoming in 2021, winner of the Newfound Prose Prize). Her work has appeared or is upcoming in The American Poetry Review, Poets.org, Kenyon Review Online, Gulf Coast, Sixth Finch, The Common, Poet Lore, Poetry Northwest, The Cortland Review, and elsewhere. She has an MA in Linguistics from UCLA and an MFA in Creative Writing in Fiction from Rutgers University, Newark.

Beverly Acha is an artist from Miami, Florida. She received a BA in American Studies and Studio Art from Williams College, an MFA in Painting and Printmaking from Yale University School of Art, and studied at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Acha has exhibited in New York at Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center, Underdonk, The Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, Rubber Factory, Lighthouse Works, DC Moore Gallery, Smack Mellon, Collar Works, International Print Center of NY (IPCNY), El Museo del Barrio, La MaMa Galleria, and LeRoy Neiman Gallery, among others. She has also shown work across America, including Greater Reston Art Center in Virginia, Laundromat Art Space in Florida, Cloud Tree Studios & Gallery in Texas, Roswell Museum & Art Center in New Mexico, and Public Land in California. Acha’s artist residencies include the Vermont Studio Center, MacDowell, CUE Art Foundation, The Lighthouse Works, Wassaic Project, and The RAiR Foundation. Currently based in Austin, Acha is Assistant Professor at the University of Texas. An excerpt from her upcoming book, Artists in the Studio: On Doubt, can be viewed online, and more of Acha’s work is available through her website.