For a few months, I lived in a place that was cold. When I stood at thefront door, in the foreground I saw a lawn covered with snow, in themiddle ground a house being built, and in the background mountainsthat were white and craggy, like clean teeth. The house being built wasa box of raw…
I I learn how to breathe underwater—spring vacation, 1978. Aunt Nayyer takes me to the Caspian where the stray herrings die by the sable shore. She raises her arms in prayer for all the bounty we haul home and feast for dinner. Each fish the size of my hand. All brine and grit.Carcasses stack over our palms,their dorsal fins…
slapped me todayopen hand swiftlyacross my face like he did would gunshot flame set the block the nightsky alight i don’tknow why i’m not the only one who mattersthe only one sittingon the bed head in handsshoulders tremblingas water does beforeit falls from a leaf a reply not rushed me stood before me alonei nearly…
When the air is this soft, when insects and birds are the soundtrack, when your skin is dried salt from the sea, and your clothes are strung out on a line in a yard whose path to the road is familiar and empty and open to an ocean you hear butcan’t see, whose wash is alive witha friend who is…
If I knew how to enter this moment I would tell you about my father,who entered a mission in California, went straight to the guestbook,and asked my mother for a pen. He wrote the words shame on andthe rest can be filled in with many words. He said Native Americanswere used by the church, and it is…
And if the family is in a car drivingAnd if the car is a 1965 Ford FalconWith a Hi-Po 289, velocity stacksSticking out of the hood, solidFront axle for drag racing, and ifThe car is running on retreadsAnd if the car is on an inclineOn the way back from Bud LakeAnd the sun is angled…
Raised by grief, raised by hunger, the bowls of cornflakes she ate alone at night. Raised by the 4:00 a.m. ring calling her to open up, roughnecks waiting at the café door. Raised away from language, English she was not allowed to speak. Raised into anger—men she was not allowed to see and the one she sneaked off…
I would have hefted heaven and earth aloft to keep your hearts thumping in your thorny chests,your world-weary lungs filling like accordions, your eyes shining with visions pierced by glee. But you performed your leave-taking dutifully— such are nature’s commandments, its ordained cycles—so, though your vanishing slowed my life with sorrow, I no longer saw you in the wavering…
How would I know, don’t you seeI haven’t washed my hands? Howcould I even talk about anything?I don’t remember anything fromSyria or my childhood or anything.Why would you ask such a stupidquestion? Your father should havebeen a monk. They come to thiscountry with money. Money, moneymoney. Why do you think it has takenso long? Oh,…
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