in honor of my new cork shooz
by Hikari Leilani Miya
for maggie
I. in which i am thankful
first, to the great cork oak
and all the spaces for breath.
far from portugal, i googled
your life so everyone can see
your removed exterior. thank you
for protecting me from
the heat and sun
a continent away.
second, to maggie and that bright
pink sticky note with SHOOOOZ
bless you
on a saucony box i thought she
scribbled on with a fine black pen
but it was just shapless topography
webbing brown space like mycorrhizae
third, to all the nameless trees
whose bark and pulp condensed
formed that tissue paper, that box, that
laminated saucony sticker,
bleached pink lined note stuck
inside my drawer and my brain.
fourth, to however many cows
were involved in the softness
of leather bound to never again
tread the earth of a farm. i’m hoping
the number is less than 0.53 cows.
II. in which i daydream
i’m somewhere along a long stretch
of portugal coast in a sleek white boat
wearing tan that could be shoes or
my feet. i hang my legs over ocean
that is so vividly blue and clear
i think that someone poured dye
into it. it doesn’t seem possible
for all those fish to live down there.
but it seems so inevitable when
the flash of a carapau is hooked
and arcs onto the shining deck.
the last thing it sees are these shoes.
III. in which i ponder
who put all those tiny holes therea
nd how did they do it so artfully
without triggering any sense of
trypophobia. how thin is the line
between beauty and fear? discomfort
and grace? i’ve never known laces
to be so tightly, simply hidden
under some flaps that have a name,
surely, i would mispronounce. if
this grayish cream sole were an ice
cream flavor, i’d buy two and give
one to the trees and the ants and earth.
IV. in which i don
i walk into friday’s class and am annoyed
because no one comments about my shoes.
they are from maggie, i project very loudly
to all ten students who stare at me very
nervously, thinking who the fuck is maggie?
because i thought we were supposed to be
learning about discourse communities and
she sure as hell ain’t in any of mine. i quote
the FSU reddit page: she’s a troll, not like
an edgelord, but i heard she lives in like,
a basement. i teach on top of the table
so that my shoes are more at eye level. today,
i say, we will be learning about questions.
like how many trees donate bark to your
dorm rooms each year (is that a good
question?) and why shoes are perceived as
necessary as we traverse this brown earth together
Hikari Leilani Miya is an LGBTQ Japanese-Filipina American who graduated from Cornell University in 2019 with a BA in English, and from University of San Francisco with an MFA in Creative Writing. She is a scholarship-awarded student in Florida State University's PhD program in creative writing, where she is a member of the Asian American Student Union and Vice President of the university's first Herpetology Club. Her poems have been published or are forthcoming in dozens of in-print and online magazines across North America, including MacGuffin, Chestnut Review, Eunoia Review, Broadkill Review, and Cobra Milk. In 2021, she was a semi-finalist for the Red Wheelbarrow poetry prize judged by Mark Doty. Her first book of poems, sold out at AWP 2024, is published with Cornerstone Press. She currently lives in Tallahassee with her snakes, leopard gecko, and disabled cat, and volunteers at the Tallahassee Museum specializing in reptile care and handling. In addition to earning her master's certification in herpetology from the Amphibian Foundation and certification in husbandry and captive management, she is a former health care worker, percussionist, pianist, and competitive card game player.