Michelle Ortega

Michelle Ortega has been published at Tweetspeak Poetry, Tiferet Journal, Exit 13, Shrew LitMag, Shot Glass Journal, Snapdragon: A Journal of Healing, and elsewhere online and in print. Don’t Ask Why (chapbook, Seven Kitchens Press) was released August 2020. Tissue Memory (microchap, Porkbelly Press) was released in February 2022.

After and Before

New Year’s Eve, 1989

was a beginning, although I didn’t recognize it then; I ached for a world-altering kiss at midnight, but the one I received was dry and common; I forgot about the boy, but still remember the softness of my Levi button-fly’s after a week of travel, and the way a matchbook slid under my palm from the back pocket, and the Gauloises in my bag, and the Eiffel Tower backlit with fireworks at midnight; I remember a bottle of wine passed between friends, winding through crowds on les grands boulevards, shouting bonne année á tout le monde! until I was hoarse; I remember that night in black and white, fuzzy focus because I shot film with my Minolta x700; I still feel the camera in my hand, its coolness pressed to my cheek, the shutter’s pulse with each exposure.

New Year’s Eve, 1993

was an ending, although I didn’t recognize it then; I numbed myself for that world-halting kiss at the altar, didn’t know I could walk away, or run; I forgot about Paris, but remembered to move carefully in raw silk––the gown, delicate, no pockets––and to sneak outside and smoke a Marlboro light with my cousin’s wife, and to watch fireworks over the field at midnight; I remember dancing with my bridesmaids, no groom in sight, all the champagne toasts and me, sober, realizing I had no voice as I mouthed “I do,” because I didn’t; I remember the photographer was so efficient, each photo so carefully posed, ordinary, airbrushed later for perfection; after the divorce, I bundled the album for trash, satisfied when it hit the bottom of the can.

The Shape of Someday

On the family room floor,
my daughter and I lay flat
in front of the tv and a box 
fan, staving off the first heat 
blast of summer vacation.
Lately, we speak the language
of careful words (mine) 
and death stares (hers) 
and slammed doors (ours),
but a movie and the morning
inertia nudge us into shared
space with little energy for
something else. I have to thank
that rodent, Remy—the gourmet-
cooking, looking-for-his-place-
in-the-world rat from Ratatouille. 
Misunderstood by his family, 
separated from the colony, he 
emerges from a terror-tour 
through sewers onto the streets
of Paris. As he marvels at 
the animated Eiffel Tower,
my rising eighth-grader lets
her wish loose: someday, I 
want to go to Paris. I remember
making the same wish in eighth
grade; then, too quickly, I reply:
someday, we will. Later on, 
for the rest of that week, on 
Saturday when she’s at her Dad’s, 
I can’t swallow the shape 
of someday on my tongue, 
can’t shake it from my mind.