Rejection After the Reading
Someone brought tacos
to the basement bar—
al pastor, slick with pineapple
and something red
that warned from the foil.
I took one
because she handed it to me
with both hands
and said nothing.
We ate standing—
elbows touching,
our breath fogging the same patch
of mirror behind the liquor shelf.
My tongue lit up
mid-bite.
Heat
that made my eyes water
the way they do
when I say too much
in a poem
and no one cries.
She nodded once
like I’d passed
some unspoken threshold,
then wiped her fingers
on the hem of my draft
and said,
now you’re getting it.
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