The year before we marry, we’ve come a thousand miles by motorcycle
to this town in Mexico. We leave the’79 Goldwing parked
and wander up and down the dusty streets, waiting for our laundry.
Hand in hand, we might as well be in Paris, the way we adore
everything: the rowdy joy of boys scrambling for a plastic basketball,
rusty air conditioner as hoop, the sugar from churros we lick off our fingers
and wipe on our jeans, the lopsided sounds of a band paid in beer.
When the beginning of rain chases us back to the motel, you are restless
in the yellow stucco room and go out into the night. Your bike engine roars
then recedes into the sounds of distant traffic and the leaky faucet.
I lean into my notebook recording whispers to my future self that say:
Don’t forget. And wake to you in the doorway, backlit, smiling, holding out
a paper plate of grilled onions and meat as if offering me the moon.
Photo Credit: Wonderlane Antique Mexican folk art painting, Jardin de los Siervas, Dulce Hogar.