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  • honduras of Despair
  • Sheila Maldonado (bio)

I've known depthsof mountain valleysof flood waters

my family comesfrom the Depthsdepths of scarcity

they clawedtheir way outinto another abyss

honestly I've onlyknown their depthson vacation

I'm from fortress projectson an island at the edgeof a city far northof the ancestral deep

I've been integrated into schoolsincorporated into office buildingsinstitutions all with walls so highthey could house armies jail masses

you could scream and no one would hear you

my depths are depressions grooves in the soul erodedhieroglyph etchings can barely make out definitions infinitehow far I am from my blood how low I can sink how ugly I gethow little I can handle how few I can save how I can't save myself [End Page 435]

Sheila Maldonado

Sheila Maldonado, an amateur Mayanist and backup singer, has published poems in Rattapallax, Meridians, Live Mag!, and Promethean. She teaches creative writing in the New York City public schools through Teachers & Writers Collective.

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