Ode to Monday Morning Runs in Central Park

(after Patrick Rosal)

this is an ode to the homeless guy/
who says God bless you/ three times/
every time I run by/ this is an ode to
the people who run by me/ to the
people who are faster/ an ode to
accepting I’m slow/ an ode to going
from point A to point B back to point
A/ this is an ode to returning/ an ode
to the dogs/ who are experts in returning/
balls back to their owners/ an ode
to the children who blow bubbles/
knowing/ that they’ll fly away/ and
burst/ in midair/ who know that they’ll
never return/ and who don’t seem to care.

Alejandro Pérez is a Latinx student at Columbia University in New York. He is a 2019 Pushcart Prize nominee whose poems and flash fiction pieces have appeared or are forthcoming in Blue Earth Review, DIAGRAM, Typehouse Magazine, decomP, Santa Clara Review, HEArt Online, Pigeonholes, and Jellyfish Review.