Winter Nap
CARLOS A. DEJUANA
I awoke smelling magnolias,
the sweet sticky smell
hanging thick between
the ferns and humid air.
Or was it the sharp odor
of onions in the fields
across the tracks that
no longer exist,
its scent carried by a warm breeze
in the moonlight,
as I walked barefoot,
naked but for my shorts,
across the driveway
to put a hurried and
forgotten letter
in the mail?
Carlos A. DeJuana is a native Texan but has lived in Washington, DC, the past 12 years. His poetry has appeared in Live Nude Poems, Synethesia, and riversEdge (published by UT-Pan American). A former journalist, he now works for the federal government. When he’s not taking care of my wife and two kids or scribbling down poems, he tries to find time to take a nap.