‘Mexicali’ by Jenn Givhan

I was young & slipping
into splatter

I first fell in love with Jenn’s poetry when I read her beautiful chapbook Lifeline, and this new poem is a testament to her ability as a poet living in this uncertain and tumultuous time. The setting—Mexicali itself, a city of clashing modernity and agriculture, a city full of “tequila / & holy water”. You can taste the truth and thirst of each line, how every word grows a kind of hunger within. The speaker takes the forms of god Quetzalcóatl, a woman, a “border crosser, / rosary holder”. Here, border becomes more than its geographical definition: it is a sense of being and identity.

The Offing