When I went to Iceland
my family said
I wouldn’t know what to do
with my luggage.
Their worries were
like wishes.
Did you know 70 percent of Icelanders
believe in Huldovolk? Now I believe
the reason I go
is to come back home.
There’s only one road in Iceland,
a loop.
Loopy became a word we used
to make time stop.
But in Iceland I climbed
to the top of a glacier.
The air was so clean
my face burned and peeled
like a shape shifter.
(I thought, I could learn to sleep here.)
The night I came home
my brother laid awake
sweating into his sheets.
I found him gripping
the digital clock,
as if to keep the numbers from shifting.
My family wouldn’t believe
there are no loops in Los Angeles.
Even Mulholland Dr keeps going
hilltop to hilltop
until the pavement crumbles
and divides.