Sebastián Hasani Páramo
One afternoon in Texas, the sky will turn black.
One afternoon in a small town, the sky will hail
Suddenly the family cook-out will ruin itself.
Suddenly the evening will scrub away.
Suddenly the embers will smolder in the West.
One afternoon entropy will slow jet streams.
Suddenly bald cypress trees will ask to sprout again.
Suddenly rains will pour, deluge us from memory.
One morning there will be a scar.
One morning in Texas, the scar will speak.
Galactic historians will study this scar for generations.
Suddenly nothing will remain, not even seeds in our vaults.
Until finally, the prickly pears bloom.
A baby born years later will adjust Texas on a map
until suddenly there’s a planet that forgets light years away.
Sebastián Hasani Páramo is a CantoMundo Fellow, a former Dobie Paisano Fellow, and is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of English at Austin College in Sherman, Texas. He is the founding editor of The Boiler and Poetry Editor for Deep Vellum.
