Coffee?

By Gaby Montañez Gutiérrez

If I were to write a poem about all my friends,

I wouldn’t use paper, nor black pen.

I’d need the string lights that hang from our place,

the branches we climbed, the words my tongue saves.

When I write about my friends, I think of that month,

how my heart shared space, air, and lunch.

Every other Thursday, I cross a fragile line,

forgetting how to breathe, or how to stay fine.

But oh, my dearest friends,

they pull me from the black hole’s end.

They bring me back, they make me whole,

they hand me laughter instead of control.

I call them mochilas, though they don’t know why,

they think it’s a secret, but I don’t clarify.

They’re because they hold what I need:

the air, the key, the me I can’t always feed.

No one’s smarter than all of my friends,

and through them, my own mind bends.

They make me proud of who I am,

of all I’ve learned and all I can.

And there’s nothing better, you see,

than feeling like someone needs me.

To help, to share, to understand,

to be useful just by being at hand.

To those who know how to make me cry,

and fix it with a hug, no need to try.

My dearest friends now live in my heart,

their warmth rewrites my every start.

My dearest friend has an orange heart,

her laugh a light, her hugs an art.

When she holds me, the world stands still,

and every ache forgets its will.

A cuddle with her reaches my soul,

a quiet warmth that makes me whole.

The room I go when I come undone,

the sweetest place I’ve ever known.

I explain to him what enjambment means,

while my thoughts spill out between.

He nods, pretending it’s just a line,

but really, it’s my way of crossing time.

He lent me his jacket; it still smells like rain.

Kram: a warmth no metaphor could steal.

It fills my chest, it calms my fight,

I love it, but I won’t cry. Not again. Not tonight.

She’s stunning, but not in a mirror’s way,

she glows in green, in thought, in day.

We eat ice cream until we melt,

and share the silence others can’t help.

She listens the way oceans hear,

quiet, patient, pulling near.

Her calm becomes my favorite sound,

a peace I’m lucky to have found.

He once said “family,” and I stopped cold,

no one had said that word so bold.

In a place where I belong to none,

he made me feel like I was someone.

He believes Vienna is waiting for me to cry,

songs that hurt and heal, I still don’t know why.

Sometimes I steal his things for revenge,

and that small chaos somehow makes sense.

When things get hard, she’s simply there,

a steady heartbeat in the air.

Her kindness, her voice is clear,

and somehow she makes the world sincere.

She’s my Dorothea, she’ll know what I mean,

our late-night talks hum evergreen.

She keeps the light when I feel small,

and catches me before I fall.

When my friends laugh, I want to be near,

to be the reason, to breathe their cheer.

Each giggle gives me life anew,

I think joy smells like them too.

They don’t call first, they don’t reach out,

sometimes they make me twist in doubt.

But then they smile, and I forgive,

because they remind me how to live.

They don’t fit my definition of friends,

the kind that plan or tie loose ends.

But they built me a home with laughter and grace,

and love that feels like a holy place.

If I were to write a poem about all my friends,

I’d still skip the paper and the pen.

I’d write it with the hearts they lend,

because they’re not my friends:

they’re where I end and begin again.