for AB, Malik, Z & Curtis

our gods must be jazz, the improvisational fire
stewing cow hooves into menudo or banana rice

the whole damn pig skinned, dipped in a fryer
for fatback, chicharrón. The calloused finger

carefully skimming the hot grease
of creation plucks dimensions from nothing

but five strings, a thumbnail cutting nickelplated
wire to prove physics is something better

than witchcraft—if heaven is anything
like this bar or any place else i know

i don’t deserve it. The blood red wine
barely older than me watches the bartender

pour water in whiskey while no one knows
no better. The best explanations for the origins

of light can be miraculous when there’s still so much
more to know—the riddles liquor alone have solved

with a stumble & some gravity, vodka
& an open wound. Everyone holds a bubbling can

of soda to the roof, each sour pop rising more
purposefully than any of our drunk toes tipping

to hi hats, a crowd of bodies singing & spilling drinks,
our open mouths offering ivory keys to play

your music, waiting to be suspended in two
hands peeling at the fleshy beauty of waking

unanchored, strangers someplace strumming
together, not knowing how long, when.

Esteban Ismael is a National City native and Instructor with the San Diego College of Continuing Education where he teaches literature and writer's workshops. He is the recipient of First Prize in Poetry from Dogwood: A Journal of Poetry & Prose, selected as a Second Rounder in the Austin Film Festival’s 2016 teleplay spec script competition, and nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Spillway. His poems are forthcoming or have recently appeared in Poetry Northwest, Southern Humanities Review, Ruminate Magazine, Harvard Review, Puro Chicanx Writers of the 21st Century, and Conduit, among other fine journals.

Lucy Bell is an artist based in Northern California working in painting, illustration, murals, and mixed media. She is curious about religion, rituals and the subversion of both. Bell’s work explores her own personal mythology and how it intertwines with motifs of folk art traditions. Bell graduated in 2020 with a BA in Studio Arts from UC San Diego. Since then her work has been published locally and internationally. Bell’s work has shown in San Francisco, Santa Cruz, San Diego, and Livermore.