"Geodetic Survey Three-Dimensional Changes in Crustal Motion at mm Scale" By Laura Grevel

Geodetic Survey Three-Dimensional Changes in Crustal Motion at mm Scale

My first country is the size of a grain of sand, the size of a ticking minute, the size of a clicking trigger, the size of a tadpole kicking, the size of the little blue pond in the garden where a blackbird drinks. My first country is also the size of the Milky Way in a West Texas night, the size of a cicada’s exoskeleton clinging to a live-oak branch, the size of the Grand Canyon’s pink and orange hide, the size and the sighs of a three-day Certified Public Accountancy Exam. My first country is, on certain days, the size of the Longhorns Marching Band performing Crazy Orange Bread in the University of Texas Football Stadium, the size of a trumpet spitting, the size of the football just kicked, the size of eleven Black football players on their knees in protest, the size of twenty-two law students playing frisbee at Harvard Law School, the size of a book called Catch-22, the size of high-rise glass office buildings where people stare out and want to go down.

My first country is the size of an incredibly sour wild Mustang grape hanging over Waller Creek, the size of the first Whole Foods Grocery down on Lamar Boulevard packed with shoppers and a mariachi band, the size of the little red Mountain Laurel bean that we rubbed on the hot concrete and then burned each other’s legs with when we were eight, the size of fresh tamales at Christmas, the size of a ram after drought, the size of a million acres burning in wildfire, the size of a bluebonnet meadow blooming after rain, the size of my grandfather’s booming voice saying, “We got an inch of rain. It’s beautiful!”

My first country is also the size of a baby’s laugh, the size of a gunshot, the size of a women’s peace march, the size of a coffin. The size of 100,000 coffins marching down the road to protest gun deaths. My first country is the size of the 1960s, of a race riot where a youth named Cisco slapped a school bus with a big chain, the size of children’s screams, the size of an Armadillo World Headquarters rock concert, the size of Willy Nelson and Eddy Ramone and Led Belly on stage together, the size of a 1975 bright red fire engine truck, the size of a hurricane named Elva that lifted houses and set them down with cows inside, the size of a child riding downhill with no hands on the handlebars.

My first country is even the size of a front porch with two old lady best friends chatting, the size of an attic on a broiling day with eight children discovering a nest of new-born mice nicely pink, the size of a cockroach on your face, the size of a UFO at a camp-out that bursts into sight, turns a corner, and disappears.

My first country is the size of me.

Laura Grevel

Laura Grevel is a performance poet, fiction writer, and blogger. She has performed her poetry in Texas and Europe. Her work is eclectic, tackling the immigrant experience, narratives, character sketches, and even grackle squawks. She has been published in Hear Her Speak, Unlatched Podcast, Poetry and Covid, Fevers of the Mind, WORD!, Poets Against Racism USA, Poetry and Settled Status For All, OpenDoor Magazine, DIY Poetry Zine, Dreich, and her YouTube channel. Her performances have been included in festivals, including Edinburgh Fringe Online, Cresswell Crags, Punk 4 The Homeless, Hotchpotch/Dundee, Nottingham and Derby.

Headshot: Joachim Grevel

Photo Credit: Staff