Chapters, timers on stoves, toothpaste—
these things warn about their ends. Timing
belts. Miscarriages. A skinny little trans-
planted tree giving up on itself. These
don’t. Like an open-armed daughter who
tears across a playground. Like a tired one,
almost grown, pleading carry me carry me!
Ghost moments. Like you and I talk.
That daughter kisses me goodbye and
gets on the Metro de Madrid. Three stops
to her apartment. I turn into the day.
An old metal-cased phone booth rises
up and out of the concrete crossroad.
Sky-blue side panels, grass-green tented
top, matte metal face, buttons to nowhere.
Nothing to hold onto. Slathered in symbols:
resta’irador / Hello My Name is / De meulbles y
antigüdades / numtas / 91 478 30 42 /
Nana Karamel Tatoo / IBIZIA59 / JUAN GALGO /
FCK PIGS
Palimpsests and echoes, messages crawling out of
bottles, regrowing tentacles: acetylcholinesterase
in action. We have this protein, too. Los Madrileños
reaching out and receiving. Even though their ghost
lines ache. Even though those lines have been
Chapin Cimino is a creative writer living, writing, and teaching near Philadelphia. Besides connection, she loves daughters, risotto, properly made sidecars, cities without skyscrapers, and raising her heart rate. Chapin’s creative work has appeared in Hippocampus, The Write Launch, The Dewdrop, and The Curator.