i don't like to admit it
Isa Cayetano

but i can only breathe if it burns.

abuela can’t sleep with the fan on
and every ten minutes she yells over the bookshelves
    you feel hot?
    yes
    you crazy.

it’s ninety degrees and humid tonight
feels like 104

     feels like God’s wrath.

sometimes i think that everything bad in my life is punishment for the time my brother and i terrorized a lizard for no reason at ages four and seven,
     respectively.

maybe it doomed me to a liminal existence
maybe i’ve never even been a person,

      just unbearable.

maybe my skin is scorched beyond recognition.

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