If I Woke Up in Temescal Unwoman

If
I woke up
In Temescal more than once
I would have fallen in love

Not with you
But with your neighborhood
Which had already carved itself
Into memory in real-time
Burned with luminous skin
In the late morning sun

And the perilously foreign-yet-familiar feel
Of someone’s hand in mine
The treacherous ways I was at your command
Gave in completely
Because I’d found peace at long last

Is each successive rejection
A Russian doll
A little smaller but rеally just the same
Mocking me
Evеn though
So few of my stars were hung on your tree

I will mourn every loss
I want to tear out your heart in response
But you would have to see what you are missing
And we know you are blind
To the charms I tell myself I still wield
You’ve tacitly declared
Them
Invisible