Stephen Briseño
It's True, They Don't
I announce to my daughter while
we stroll by the elephant enclosure
and she looks at me wide-eyed
and I know the cogs are moving
and I know that she is about to come back at me
with something brilliant
and sweet and tender
and her quip will stir up my heart. I’m sure of it.
And I begin to envy them
because one day I know I will forget
this conversation and forget
the look on her face and how
her smile is a broken piano with two missing keys,
and forget all of the other tiny things
she says that are actually much bigger
than her body and too much for me to absorb,
and how my off-handed announcement
is a sober reminder to
remember as much as we’re able
until she finally proposes:
Is that why elephants are so big? They carry
all their memories inside?
we stroll by the elephant enclosure
and she looks at me wide-eyed
and I know the cogs are moving
and I know that she is about to come back at me
with something brilliant
and sweet and tender
and her quip will stir up my heart. I’m sure of it.
And I begin to envy them
because one day I know I will forget
this conversation and forget
the look on her face and how
her smile is a broken piano with two missing keys,
and forget all of the other tiny things
she says that are actually much bigger
than her body and too much for me to absorb,
and how my off-handed announcement
is a sober reminder to
remember as much as we’re able
until she finally proposes:
Is that why elephants are so big? They carry
all their memories inside?
Biography
Stephen Briseño's (he/him/his) writing first appeared in Memoir Mixtapes. Since then, his poems have appeared in Glass: A Journal of Poetry, L'Éphémère Review, formercactus, Barren Magazine, and Rabid Oak. He lives in San Antonio with his wife and daughter, teaches middle school English, and drinks far too much coffee. Follow him on Twitter: @stephen_briseno