Greetings From Cambria, California!
I spent 2 hours trying to find us
a shareable full-size camping mattress,
knowing the distance
between two lovers in a tent could be the breaking point if we let it
and you were letting
the tent door hang open like a wet eyelid–unkissed and letting all the smoke in from the campfire not yet out. Pissing embers refusing to lose their red eyes
like maybe I did–
sobbing a monsoon over the West Coast while sleeping on the barrel-chested earth with you,
when I listened for your heartbeat
change
when you held me– becoming stronger– as if it took twice the pulse to hold something
you could no longer make work,
as the next morning you worked a twig along the open flame with a slice of bread nearly incinerated with scar tissue.
The Big Sur slides the sun
out of its rock-necked throat; the campground showers steam. We hadn’t showered in days.
I wasn’t about to get undressed
and leave the question mark of us behind on a Californian bathhouse where we were supposed to leave a camper’s pledge:
leaving it better than you found it,
leaving a rain barrel under a redwood,
leaving for this vacation with the intention to fall more in love.
Driving out of the heart of the coast.
Drinking bottled water between gulping the pits of what we know now,
no one mentioning the next time, the best time, the
campfire’s stench on our clothes.
Letting our love rot onto the piccolo veins of the jade rock.
There’s a drop to the ocean from me to you. You’re leaving me better
than you found me.
Biographical Note: Sara Green is a queer spoken word poet and Connecticut native. Her poems have appeared in Freshwater Magazine and on various stages on the American East Coast. She is currently working towards a Bachelor’s degree and secondary teaching certificate at Eastern Connecticut State University. Though she goes by Sylvia Wrath when she plays roller derby, she hopes she can one day earn the title of Professor Green—and teach creative writing to college students.