Callicarpa americana | Elizabeth Anguamea
The beautyberry’s fruit clings together
like a showy ball of cells. They leave
purple lacking, so bright their ripe bodies.
It is October, with highs in the nineties.
Everything sensible is dozing, deep in
summer dormancy, and I no longer feel
guilt for drinking my way through the
seasons end, cell-less womb yet empty
as the names I yearn to ascribe to you.
We watch military chinooks fly in asym-
metrical formation over the city, great
bodies slow as the bumblebees whose
lumbering grace at the yucca brings me
closest I’ve gotten to god in a while. We
sleep uncovered, ceiling fan ticks along.
You dream of flashes of light and I of buds
setting wild on the aster. An altogether
different sort of purple. Things will awaken
soon, life will climb up from her roots for
a final flourishing before toothed leaves
fall to the earth. Drupes will cling un-
abashed to beautyberry’s naked, arching
limbs. Chinooks will rumble languidly
over us at home while military aid rains
death on civilians abroad. Hurricanes
will tear inland as we choke down our
drought. It will be the hottest year on
record and I will be here, dormant as the
aster, trying to remember who we were
before they called us all purple.
about the author:
Elizabeth Anguamea is a writer and educator born and based in Central Texas. She holds a B.A. in Anthropology and a Master of Education. She has translated two books of poetry from the Spanish, Jaguar Commissioner (Oralibrura, 2021) and Skin People (Gusanos de la Memoria, 2020). Her work has been previously published in The Hopper and Wild Roof Journal.