July 10, 2023
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Leper on the Lawn, by the Front Door
By Leslie Contreras Schwartz
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Leper on the Lawn, by the Front Door
By Leslie Contreras Schwartz
I go outside to dress
in day, its half sun.
It’s been six months
post coronavirus
and my weakened body
can only walk from room to room—
the neighbor does not wave.
A rustle of white-blue sky
trees tossing heads and outright
skipping. Whether I’m lucid
or not—I checked messages.
How could you
infect other people Keep your sickness
Here’s a list of all the ways you have wronged me
I’ll light a candle for you Hope you feel better soon
I’m here, now, beside me the gulping air and a treble
in the vermillion banana-leaf plant next door
or the pluck of the swing in mid-air
my half breath, and my daughter flying.
The certainty of her dark crown.
Above her the feathered green shook,
then stilled.
Heavy, down to the knotted-black chair.
I’m stilled and shorn. I know my neighbors now.
If there were wounds to bear, I’d leave
a trail of blood crossing the street
just to tell my neighbor Shabbat Shalom
and go fuck yourself. I’m alive.
Wishing for that wound,
I drink a steaming hot sip
of a thousand cups
to a rollercoaster heartbeat.
I don’t quit.
Leslie Contreras Schwartz
Leslie Contreras Schwartz is a multi-genre writer, a 2021 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow, and the 2019-2021 Houston Poet Laureate. She is the winner of the 2022 C&R Press Nonfiction Prize for From the Womb of Sky and Earth, a lyrical memoir (Fall, 2023). She is the author of five collections of poetry, including The Body Cosmos(Mouthfeel Press, 2024) and Black Dove / Paloma Negra (FlowerSong Press, 2020). Contreras Schwartz is currently a poetry and nonfiction faculty member at Alma College's MFA low-residency program in creative writing.
Image Description: Photo of a Latina with light skin and indigenous features and dark hair past her shoulders wears a wine colored dress and smiles slightly, against a backdrop of greenery.