You’ll Be Given Love by Norma Liliana Valdez

the first movement was this: her touch
in the softness of my hair

my hair giving over to the wilderness under her sun
all day it blew surrendered in its gestures

her hands startled me a little
enough to shake the blackbird in my cage

that guardian of never-would-be’s
even he rattled

fell off his perch
and turned to humming

Norma Liliana Valdez is the author of the chapbook Preparing the Body (YesYes Books, fall 2019). A member of the Macondo Writers’ Workshop and a CantoMundo fellow, her work appears in The Rumpus, PANK Magazine, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, and the anthology Latinas: Struggles & Protests in 21st Century USA, among others. She lives in the Bay Area (California).