Parts of the Day
The cliff is not very far.
A white horse is tied to the lamp post.
He is more precious to me than my own breath.
They took my passport away.
I wear a necklace of lapis lazuli.
Sometimes I sleep with a pigeon tied to my ankle.
The Indian swiftlet lives in air, drinks on the wing.
They poured chemicals into my veins to make me well again.
The flagpole is smoldering, no one understands this.
Half naked, she strolls into a cafe, orders pastis.
Malayalam is my mother tongue (palindrome).
Someone draws water from a well, her hands are sore.
A scrawny dog in the Mahabharata bolts up a mountain slope.
Someone learns to swim in a pool of lava.
A black horse is lashed to barbed wire.
When Liu Xiaobo died, they tossed his ashes into the sea.
I am frightened by my own death.
Seeing Krishna on the battlefield Arjuna knelt and wept.
The oven is starting to smoke, there is a cake inside.
For my seventh birthday I wore a pink party dress.
Grandmother is going blind.
Where is Aleppo? She does not know.
Ashwaganda, miracle herb, will it cure us?
Stony soil, cut body parts, periplus of stars
Sister
I.
My little sister
Sings in the bulrushes
Once we were three
She has gone to heaven
Instead of me.
II.
This illness sharpens everything
Light tossed into a swampy room
What matters—bowl of roses
Bag of rice
A hairbrush useless now
Bones under the scalp
Shining through.
