Still Life Preceding CDMX

by Elisa Luna Ady

 

I dream of movie theaters populated with non- playable characters Orderly seats opening to our asses Always there’s a delay A projection of indelicate light marbles our faces Deep waters in dear sleep Any cinema is a holy place if you accept The distance to darkness Once I turned to Dream Miguel during the trailers Asked if he was sad to be selling his belong- ings & moving to Ciudad de México? I had interrupted the commercials for whom language is color & the audience of no one Dream Miguel lacked punctuation Became grave He admitted in these final days of June sadness had set in My brain remembered to update Dream Miguel’s blond mullet Dream Mariam wandered in toting a popcorn bucket like a baby Precious cargo Asked what she’d missed I told her Dream Miguel was grieving Chicago But wouldn’t stop writing about lucha libre & masculinity The theater accordioned to accommodate our narrative arc I woke with the impression I’d intuited some minor emotional truth Before realizing Dream Miguel & Dream Mariam have no autonomy Dream Miguel isn’t sad It’s me So I set-dress fraudulent coliseums of light Empty seats & saturation Transmit silent images across a giantess screen Write indulgent dialogue There I talk to myself about these people I love Playing doll Happily I talk to myself about all these people I love.

 

 

Elisa Luna Ady is a writer from Southern California. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in the Adroit Journal, Passages North, Witness Magazine, and elsewhere. She lives in Chicago, where she recently completed her MFA+MA through Northwestern University’s Litowitz Program and where she was awarded the 2025 English Department Prize for best MFA thesis. Find her on Instagram @lastsiteing and elunady.net

Published On: December 21, 2025