(after Zbigniew Herbert)
Poetry by Carmen Dolina

of my childhood, following me outside my car window.
The only companion who could keep me awake
as we passed tollbooths and gas stations along SLEX.
Switching places, changing shape, hiding
behind branches and streetlights alike. Half-asleep,
I’d peek out through the rear glass, hoping to catch you
slow down and fall back on the highway home.
We hadn’t moved up north yet, but still I knew:
on some fateful night, I’d look past the tint,
through the trees, the parting clouds, and find
the clearest sky bereft of you.

Carmen Dolina is a Filipino computer science graduate and current game development student, so she doesn’t know how she ended up writing poetry. She received a Loyola Schools Award for the Arts in 2023 for her poetry and was a fellow at the 28th Ateneo HEIGHTS Writers Workshop. Her work has appeared in HAD, HEIGHTS, horde, TLDTD, and Sweet Tree Review, among others. She released her first self-published chapbook Woke Up in a Safe House in 2023. Her biggest regret is selling her Carly Rae Jepsen tickets to go to theater rehearsals that ended up getting canceled.

Photo by Jack Taylor on Unsplash