Natasha Pepperl 12/1/21 Natasha Pepperl 12/1/21

If you live long enough

you can point with clarity to your burn
zone. When I say burn, I mean the years
you were charred

Natasha Pepperl 9/9/21 Natasha Pepperl 9/9/21

جون (Joon)

My grandmother offers joon as a great unfolding / as her backyard buzzes with dozens of deep-rooted / rosebushes pressing dry June with a knowing of garden

Natasha Pepperl 9/8/21 Natasha Pepperl 9/8/21

Ceremony of a Relocation in Fall

The sun reaches through the bare
window and fingers the cardboard
boxes and wakes us early.

Natasha Pepperl 7/1/21 Natasha Pepperl 7/1/21

First Grade Autobiography

Everything swarms

of humidity and cockroaches
and mosquitos. I slap my legs

Natasha Pepperl 6/30/21 Natasha Pepperl 6/30/21

On the men of this family: to their future lovers

These men are West Virginia pickaxe, fluent
in uprooting and the duration of heat
before a harvest. How hands can dance

Natasha Pepperl 6/30/21 Natasha Pepperl 6/30/21

What my brother’s brownness means to him

a friend recently said that I'm white
as fuck. Here's a brown education on being

American: my mother spoons food to punish

Natasha Pepperl 6/28/21 Natasha Pepperl 6/28/21

We all have a heat

We all have a vice we keep circling as house cats hunt / for an opening to squeeze through. Maybe it’s meaty / as a person or thin as a folded letter. Maybe it’s the cigar