E-S-O-T-A

Hold, Buy, Sell

We've Been Looking Everywhere for You

Fireworks

The Current

Porcelain

"I wished we could trade places. In the next breath, I didn’t. I didn’t want her in mine. Standing there, tongue-tied and incapacitated by insecurity and incompetence, not knowing how to navigate this."

We Could Be Other People

Dust

"My therapist asks me to create a list of people I’ve known who have died. To order their deaths from biggest impact to least and provide some details from when they were alive, or after they weren’t."

Inventory

"I’m inside the lobby waiting on an oil change when I hear it. Across the street, a man struggles to hold a sign against the wind. I squint to read through the shop’s window: 'You are all going to die.' 

This is what the man is yelling."

MAINTENANCE

"I’m waiting to hear if Kristen will keep her arm. If I had to guess I’d say it’s fifty-fifty. I don’t know. What I know isn’t good."

Fifty-Fifty

This is how his mother would hold him, she says. He’s cute, right?

Put it down, I say. You’re going to hurt it.

I won’t, she says. I would never.

She keeps repeating this. I would never. I would never. Holding the puppy the exact same way.

Dog People

"In my confused silence, you readjusted your hips and stood erect. A foot shorter than me, you were a commanding presence. Maybe the silence helped with that. Maybe it was because I was sitting down."

Scars

"When I realized what had happened, I laughed. An honest reflex. I explained this when you cried and accused me of thinking your pain was funny."

Reflexes

"Like everyone else, when I see the plane, I get up from the table to get a better look. I’m not exactly sure at what speed planes travel, but I know a plane must travel faster when it’s diving."

Trajectory

"One night years later after Kristen and I were married, we were arguing. I don’t
remember what we were arguing about. By this point we argued a lot."

Baggage

"Anything else? I tried to think of something else. All I came up with was, Everything’s going to be all right. In the end, I wasn’t sure about this. It was too optimistic."

Nicholas Claro

Selected work