Mexican Wedding Cookies

1 Minute Read Time

Cookie balls with powdered sugar on them, on a blue and white plate — Via https://flickr.com/photos/whitneyinchicago/

We could road trip to Tennessee from New Mexico
the kids & I	    we could be brave	     they think I’m brave

we could unroll our bags & throw our chanclas in the grass
we could barefoot it	      we could unlearn the constellations

& learn them again	     unhitch their stories from their names
like the names I’ve taken into my belly & rolled	    dough

like masa	   to my mouth	      through my cervix	   I’ve
unbound them	    I’ve squatted toward

cement	         toward asphalt	     & thick summer air
squelching in my lungs	   not enough for the work	not enough

we could love something ridiculous	        we could mix pecans
& flour & sugar into balls in our hands then scoop them

onto sheets in the oven	        sprinkle them in powder
white as that dress I swore I needed	      we could unbind ourselves

from kitchens	    from messes	    from our mama’s ideas of what
we need	for happiness	for luck	for sweetness on our tongues

we could do it	    I’ve heard a recipe for letting go tastes
eerily similar to holding on	    the difference in the butter

or the temperature	   or the salt in the batter	     but we know
I’m lying	  all the things we could & why Tennessee—

Jennifer Givhan

is a Mexican American and Indigenous poet and novelist from the Southwestern desert and the author most recently of the novel Salt Bones (Mulholland Books, 2025). She is the recipient of poetry fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and PEN/Rosenthal Emerging Voices.

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