Born in Puerto Rico, Naomi Ayala moved to the United States in her teens, eventually earning an MFA from the Bennington College Writing Seminars. An educator and arts administrator interested in environmental causes, Ayala has received numerous awards and has been a visiting humanities scholar for Hermana a Hermana/Sister to Sister and was co-chair of the board of directors for the organization Change: Building Social Justice, Starting in the Classroom; she co-founded the New Haven Alliance for Arts and Cultures. A former resident of Washington, DC, she currently lives in New Haven, Connecticut, and works as a freelance writer, educational consultant, and teaching artist.
More By This Poet
My Dad Says
I can do anything, so I try yoga nidra
to see if I can find him.
He’s been dead four years now
though I tell people when they ask, two. Just two.
My mind refuses what it wants
even if I haven’t lost anything.
One day...
Hole
One morning
they dig up the sidewalk and leave.
No sign of the truck,
only the large,
dark shadow digging and digging,
piling up sludge with a hand shovel
beside the only tree.
Two o’clock I come by
and he’s slumbering in the grass beside rat holes.
Three and...