Euphonia is caught in the downpour while stripping the clotheslines of their garments. Like all good
cyborgs she gets the job done. Dye runs and stains her fingers red. Inside the pills are rolling on the
table. The telephone rings thrice.

In the morning she will brown like a flower, like a wound. The paint on her cheeks will fade. Her
bones will calcify into junk. She will short circuit and ruin everything. Her lover will seek the
functions of a newer and glossier sum of parts.

The wind whirs like radio static. A thousand songs collide midair. The factory women huddle under
tiny waiting shed roofs. They tuck their cold hands into skirt pockets, careful not to stand too close
lest they tangle wires.

Euphonia looks out into the street, still as a statue who may be purchased into dance. When it rains
is the shining moment before erosion. Asphalt becomes obsidian. City becomes looking-glass. If a
computer were to stare, the blackness of her own reflection would blink back.

Elsewhere, her mother is waiting to tell her: when the clouds reach your end of the city, listen for my
whisper tucked beneath the staccato of rain. Wherever you are, I hope you are warm.

A question grows old in her eyes. An accusation.

Camille Aguilar Rosas recently finished her undergraduate degree in English Literature at the University of the Philippines Diliman. She volunteers for Rural Women Advocates and the Amihan National Federation of Peasant Women. She lives with ADHD and a twelve-year old calico cat. Her work has been previously published by Inklette Magazine, perhappened mag, TERSE. Journal, and others.

Image by Hayley Clues @haylee48