Written by Luke Carmichael Valmadrid
Art by Luke Carmichael Valmadrid
I can smell the sea, and yet,
the words “back then” place a corn maze
over the path to the docks, and I
lose myself all the way back home, as if the stalks were stone
or of the same diamond as your face
when neither of us could explain how
we got drunk on memories alone at that party,
the one where you came with someone else
only to talk to me for the first time in weeks,
to ask me in saltwater to talk to you outside,
where I learned I could see behind your eyes
under streetlamp lights
or an alcohol wash. I want to tell you –
the ocean never called, I just read too many seafarer stories,
the ones where so many terrible and beautiful things happen,
the ones that end before the main character and the author
even think about going home.
outlander zine 