Valentines: “Liberated Zone, 2024, The Day Before the Chicago Police Raid” by Monica Colón

Liberated Zone, 2024, The Day Before the Chicago Police Raid

It was May. Yew hedges reached with chartreuse fingers
and lilacs spun gauze shrouds.
Between the tarp aisles, a pair of mallards ambled
and nibbled roots, crumbs, beetles.
Under the biggest tent, aunties heaped lamb bones.
Students sent out the pickings on plates
of rice. Always at least two foil tins of fruit—the good kind
of apples, mandarins, navel oranges, cut watermelon
with mint leaves or tajín—at least three coolers
to bob for water or gatorade. No one smashed them.
Then the adhan. It entered the faithful. Traveled
like hormones from vial to vein, bearing
the body they foretold.
Afterward, dabke, sweaty with slipping keffiyehs,
or sign painting, Jews for Gaza / Dykes for Divestment /
Palestina Libre in colors that stayed rainfast,
or shouting in a chorus till airborne pollen trembled
and the portable toilets throbbed like timpanis
and flags shook—Philippines, Bosnia, Mexico,
Albania, Boricua, Lebanon, Palestine Palestine Palestine—

About Monica Colón

Monica Colón is a Salvadoran American writer and educator based in Chicago. This is her second publication with Honey Literary. Her poems have also appeared Boshemia, SWWIM Every Day, The Dodge, and elsewhere, and she's been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best New Poets.