Poetry

Hip-hop in the Time of Appendicitis

Hezron Pios February 11, 2021

what you don’t know can hurt you
what you don’t know can turn your body
against you
—Brian Russell

Blessed are those with low pain tolerance: The world drops you mid-air 
then asks, Are you alright? In 2014, my name got crossed out of a lineup
consisted of 12 members for an interschool dance competition I dreamt
of joining since sophomore year. If I had the guts back then, I could have 
been expelled from school at 16. If I had the guts back then, I would not be 
talking about this, and that, this, that, this, that, this, that, and this, though
I’m getting ahead of myself. The narrative begins in the part where I was in
the parking lot, practicing. Post-lunch, our crew leader turned on the music
from his portable speaker. I walked towards the stage. I warmed up and up.
Then, collapse.

Infinite Backyard Choreography

Hezron Pios February 11, 2021

Consider to pocket this moist
Layer of loam: a cache of glass, 
Ore, bones before the banyaga

Rattles the ground. The myth 
Describes a gentry of anitos 
Walked this very earth, sated

With salamanca. It should be
A given that we’ve sculpted
Enough idols in our mind