Poetry: Gifts from Jon by Yoda Olinyk

By Yoda Olinyk 

The Good: The time you made me falafels and they were burnt but I didn’t care because there was a book of poetry on the coffee table

and you had earmarked a dozen poems that made you think of me.  
Two weeks later, you asked me to fly to Mexico to see you,

and I did. We stayed upstairs from that Amish family 
that sang hymns every morning as they made breakfast.

The Airbnb with the scratchy fuchsia bedspread and the noisy 
wooden blinds and I even loved the curdled shower water 

and the ants caking the kitchen. The good was you. Sipping 
a Corona. A spot of hot sauce on your chin. Staring 

off the roof into a periwinkle sky. The back to back orgasms. Our bodies 
pretzeled. Enthusiastic 22-year-old fingers. Falling asleep 

in the sun and waking up to an ice cube 
tracing my left breast. The 2am conversations 

about God on rooftop patios. The muddled lime and mint. 

The fire roasted corn. The tlayudas. 
The rain.

The Bad: Every single time you heroically quoted 
Bukowski. Or the time you asked, “What does being in love 

even mean?” Followed immediately by the time I realized 
I was falling for someone who believed love 

was a fallacy. A few nights after I met you in Oaxaca, an earthquake 
violently ripped me out of sleep and I woke you.

You acted like it was nothing. You went back to sleep. 
You were used to the bed shaking underneath you as you slept.

But I’d just arrived, and for the next six nights, I barely slept, 
and you never asked why. There was the time you promised 

you’d buy my book 
and then you didn’t.

There was the moment I realized that I was on vacation with you 
but that I felt homesick in your arms.

The Ugly: We were at an outdoor café. Sitting across 
from one another. People watching. Eating 

juicy orange slices. You had a beer. I had a whiskey 
sour. You turned and asked me 

if I wanted to get married someday 

…and I remembered how you reacted to the earthquake and I remembered how much you admired Bukowski and I remembered you talking about love like it was something make-believe and so instead of saying The Truth — which is that the last eight weeks with you had shaken me loose from my own demons and I could see myself marrying you — I told you that I could never imagine promising myself to someone forever because everything ends and love is pain... 

And you reached across the table. You grabbed 
my hand. You said, 

“Me too.”