Burial Customs

I don’t understand how easily
you slip on a scry smile, your eyes a downcast
foreshadow of the things other girls have told you
so long ago. I don’t understand this:
why your mouth rings steadily in the fields, shelter
of wild things fallen in prayer. Yes, help me understand
all the names they’ve marked vaporlike on your rooted back,
all the names you erased in the heavy flow
of a waxing moon—yes, how you understand
why my body expels so much weight every month, can tell me
to stick something between my teeth but still run point-blank
whenever I whisper any of their names,
those angels driven into flowering crosses
lining the road to your farmhouse.

By Yvanna “Ivy” Tica

Biography:

Yvanna “Ivy” Tica is a sophomore at Faith Academy Manila where she serves as Editor-in-Chief for the Faith Review. A previous mentee of the Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program, her works have been regionally and nationally recognized by the Scholastic Art and Writing Competition. She was also a finalist for the Patricia Grodd Poetry Contest. Her works have been featured in the Filipino-American Chicago newspaper MEGAScene and the Interlochen Review. Being a Filipino TCK Christian, she is an alien on Earth in more ways than one