Laurels Literary Magazine Spring 2016 Valentine Zine | Page 10

Because
you’ve returned
By Quang Vo
Because you’ve returned
trees nurse sprig curls though 
the days are indigo and 

sandalwood hills flow 
like monsoon floods.  

You’ve returned when 
serpent days haven’t begun— 

the leaf blowers are busy at work, 
white dust pollenates your hair. 

Loving you has been too simple 
(eight letters, three words). 

Yet to love you without words, 
I would leave the salty lakes, 

to uncover the rainmaking season— 
a single sun, two cloudy shadows, 

and there the dust would fall  
like night onto your eyes.

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