in an annual yuzu hot bath, a zoo's solstice onsen
for these too-short days, too-soon orion looming

overhead. let me stand in steaming mineral soup
orbited by floating citrus and snow and awash in love

from those who believe i am enough as i arrived: wet-
eyed, wanting, heat-seeking, sleepy. give me that good

hot vapor and a pair of hands to feed me fruit, comb
my hair, tell me i'm so sweet the oranges came to bathe

with me. let me float out these dark weeks asoak in a tiny
manmade inland sea salty with rock and bone and shell

— my satsuma-oil sweat and strain dissolving back
into the universe. give me nothing less. let me change

what i will no longer accept. wash me away
and away and away, amen.




___

Adrienne Crezo (she/her/hers) is an editor, Pushcart-nominated writer, Tin House scholar (2022) and native Oklahoman of Comanche descent. She serves as an editor at Daily Kos, as a poetry reader for Okay Donkey and Kissing Dynamite Poetry, and as associate poetry editor for Pidgeonholes. You can follow her on Twitter @adriennecrezo.