Writers in the Schools publishes student work from creative writing residencies taking place in Portland, Woodburn, and Gresham every year in its annual anthology. Luna Gonzalez was a student in WITS Writer Brian Benson’s class at Lincoln HS last spring and was published in the 2021–22 anthology, To The End, Through the Tunnel. Read Luna’s poem “Coffee Trees” below.
Coffee Trees
by Luna Gonzalez
Every time I travel to my hometown in Colombia I realize I love the country even more. And not for the cheerful people that are dancing and singing all the time in the streets. Neither for the touristic spots I’ve seen hundreds of times. I love those things and wouldn’t change it for anything in the world. But what makes me love Colombia from the roots of my soul are the yellow bridges that connect the mountains while traveling for hours through cities. The way people can’t live without coffee, (even before going to sleep). The coffee trees in my grandpa’s land, that I used to sneak through and felt free. ` The sound of the motorcycles going around because in Colombia everyone owns a motorcycle. For me it is the just made arepa and eggs with tomato and onion my grandma made every time I went to her place, and she eagerly insisted on having more for the sake of my health. The smell of the stable every time I went to see the horses. For me it is the green around the cities, the sound of the rivers carrying rocks and memories and the people talking fast because they are excited. The smell of wet dirt and the adventures I live there. Every time I have to go back to the airplane, raising my feet from the land I come from, leaving the place that I can call home, my heart can’t stop aching. Reminiscing the little things that bring me joy I can realize that Colombia is the little things that I’ve only experienced there.
