tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86111363454741697422024-03-05T02:50:26.826-08:00The Inquisitive Shoe"I have a deeply hidden and inarticulate desire for something beyond the daily life." -Virginia WoolfMina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.comBlogger48125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-78582710361987943632013-01-24T21:41:00.001-08:002013-01-25T22:30:22.167-08:00how long ago, it seems, i started out<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Family is
sometimes a question.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In these
rare cases</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">my mother
is the answer--my mother</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">with her
pesto chicken pumpkin</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">My mother</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">dainty and
perfumed as a soft,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">gloved
hand. My mother</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so dear and
lovely</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">looking out
of the window at the weather</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">then
telling Nessa:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Put your
sweater on or else the cold</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">will catch
you! It doesn’t happen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">that way--I
wanted to say,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">stooped
over cereal, counting milk</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">bubbles, to
make sure I could still</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">count. I
had lost it all</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">so many
years ago--but I lost</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the number
of years</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and now I
never glance back. This</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">is the only
form of time travel</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I
know:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Looking out
for a moment unto</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">the thin
fog and feeling</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">an eye of
light, a clean origami </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">flower,
unfold inside me</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">and present
itself as </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Family, the
answer to that</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">long,
sweeping question:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Mother?
Family.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That is all
I know. </span></div>
Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-68285910281523228842013-01-04T13:16:00.001-08:002013-01-08T13:33:12.164-08:00Veruggia <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%;"> <span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: small; line-height: 200%;">In Veruggia the houses resemble<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>tin boxes<span style="font-size: small;">--</span>the ones that often carry tea leave<span style="font-size: small;">s--</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: small; line-height: 200%;">and they are
arranged cleanly along the streets, each a different color. There are thick-waisted palm trees and the
clouds are ironed flat against the sky. When I first arrived it was late
afternoon and the sky flaunted a gold dust hue. I felt light and hollow, almost
as if I could suddenly float away. The nearby fried-fish smells, huddled
with the scent of hot, splattering oil, made me feel a little dizzy and
peculiar. Then there were the ripe, bright smells of blooming flowers and the
less pleasant stench of <span style="font-size: small;">dog</span> shit smattered on the sidewalk and car exhaust
trailing around street corners. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: small; line-height: 200%;">I walked until I found myself atop a
squelchy knob of land that overlooked the pale pink ocean. The earth beneath my
feet felt porous and I soon discovered that it oozed ocean water. From afar,
the ocean had resembled a melted gumdrop, <span style="font-size: small;">and</span> upon moving closer, I discovered
that its pink color was the result of several million squirming shrimp. By now
the sky had purpled and the temperature settled into a firm chill. I watched a
flock of birds fly past until they resembled a scatter of peppercorns across
the sky. Then I noticed a mother and her child sitting upon a bench and blowing
bubbles through a bubble wand. There was something strangely peaceful about the
bubbles, which moved so slowly that they almost seemed frozen in place. It was
then that I remembered how I first arrived. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: small; line-height: 200%;">It had been an oppressively warm day,
so I had decided to leave my house and indulge in a short walk. As I walked,
the oily air slid around my elbows and greased my fingertips. I had thought,
mistakenly, that the outside temperature would be cooler but I soon discovered
otherwise. I quickly began to feel thirsty, and just when I thought I could no
longer withstand my thirst, I came upon a water fountain in the middle of a
park. It was smooth and silver. I placed one finger upon its cool, slippery rim
and felt refreshed. Then, before I even swallowed a slurp of water I saw the
bubble suspended perfectly above my nose. It was so beautiful<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>that I
found myself instantly distracted. I searched a moment for its source, but my
gaze f<span style="font-size: small;">e</span>ll too soon upon its shimmer, its swirl of greens and blues. Then, not a second later, I arrived in Veruggia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: small; line-height: 200%;">I pondered the possibility of Veruggia
being a world within a bubble. It seemed like the only explanation that would
make sense, so I decided to adopt the theory in place of the others
that had begun to take shape inside my mind. I then wondered what might happen
if the bubble were to suddenly burst. The prospect only filled me with a watery
discomfort so I decided to walk again among the streets and relish the green and yellow of the buildings. It was then that I
came across the young girl and her glittery bubble wand. She was seated on the porch of a house that I did not remember from before. It was painted
lavender and there was just one window, at the top, and it was left slightly open. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: 0.5in;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: small; line-height: 200%;">Veruggia is most beautiful in the falling
moments before sunset. I decided this while studying the hills in the
distance, speckled with smudges of pink. Then, of course, the sky, which
boasted a cornucopia of rich color. A rare breeze suddenly plucked a bubble
from its place and drew it towards where I stood. I swiveled around, in search
of the young girl, but did not find her. Instead, I suddenly felt weightless,
like my insides had whizzed away. Then it ended as quickly as it had
began. I stood, once again, before the
water fountain and inside the park. The world around me was submitting to
its own slow darkness and the park was nearly empty of all people. I stepped
forward and decided to continue my journey back home.</span></div>
Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-66621159448071214942012-12-08T14:36:00.002-08:002012-12-08T14:39:06.804-08:00disco ball recollections <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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might be, with balloons bobbing, skimming the ceiling then dropping a moment
before rising up again; and the streamers, plastic and shiny, stretching your face
into a fish-like reflection; and the brownies too sweet, and too crispy-edged;
the punch, never enough, as if you were meant to find its bowl, each time, empty,
with only a warm slurp of liquid left. And the music, every song snapped from
the top 40, the songs too familiar and too ordinary to inspire a certain
rhythm to steal your feet and sway you into motion. But then, of course, there
would be you. I envision how you might look. The image cuts quiet slivers from
my heart and throws them into the wind. I want to find you, as clichéd as this sounds,
bathed in the webby blue of those disco lights you hate, all the other dancers, crazy and sloppy and orbiting around, and you in the middle: that thin prick of
light that gets me going through it all, that makes me whimper with a
long-forgotten ease. </span><br />
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Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-13435189074528569342012-11-24T18:27:00.003-08:002012-11-24T18:35:18.468-08:00To RickyTo Ricky<br /><br />You were thirteen-<br />And pulling past the library shelves.<br />The image unfolds, warm and precise,<br />of your round face<br />pale like the opal-moon<br />or an onion. And how chubby<br />your cheeks were, then.<br /><br />Now, somewhere,<br />with a wife and children. I imagine<br />you slow-unraveling for work<br />when the sky feels dusty.<br />You might hurry<br />to conquer breakfast in the car:<br />an apple,<br />a moist smudge of banana.<br /><br />There are some moments<br />that feel like the loose ends<br />of dreams: That library afternoon,<br />do you not remember?<br />As you drifted past,<br />a hot clip of sun<br />sifted through the open window<br />and illuminated your edges, so<br />like a delicate plink of light,<br />you hummed alive.<br />
<br />Meanwhile, I sat at a table<br />on the opposite side,<br />quivering wild with worries<br />that I can no longer<br />even remember.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-79756435534802879972012-10-06T15:04:00.003-07:002013-01-04T13:27:38.557-08:00One morning my grandfather...One morning my grandfather ate so much that his chair disappeared. It was a Sunday at the Pancake House, and my grandfather sat across from me with his fat pink cheeks quivering through speech. All the while I knew he was only thinking of eating and eating and eating. Breakfast finally arrived, and the waiter set before my grandfather eight sausages, thicker than his fingers and slippery with grease, and four crinkly twists of bacon, crunchy-edged and chewy with fat. Then there were four eggs, scrambled and glittery with salt, and two brick-slabs of toast, thick and soft with butter. My grandfather ate all of this and then, in between bites and in between gulps, he often found, mysteriously, a pancake-plunk on the left side of his plate. A sailing strawberry even managed to find his mouth, along with three gulps of chocolate milk. And so, by the end of the meal my grandfather had devoured so much food that he could no longer stand up. No, the chair had melded into his bottom like gum into its wrapper when you leave it on the dashboard of your car during a warm day. He left us with no choice, then, but to steal the restaurant chair.
Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-7437690412091336992011-08-16T00:42:00.001-07:002012-10-06T14:25:38.418-07:00<br />I am certain that you have forgotten me<br />as I sit here in the center of this fat, floppy<br />bed and look out of the window that looks out unto<br />the pregnant clouds and the thin lines<br />of road. I occupy the edges of your memory, now:<br />The distant plop<br />of a spoon slipping into suds.<br />I am not <br />the bubbles that jewel your arm<br />and fingers, up to the puckered pink<br />of elbow <br />when your search<br />for the slippery<br />spoon<br />is complete. I am a faintness <br />growing fainter <br /><br />the outline of a sound Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-34746839848605383572011-08-16T00:25:00.000-07:002011-08-16T01:09:00.474-07:00Everything leaves you, in its own wayThe time will come for me to let it go--
<br />To let it all go gently drifting down
<br />The sad expectations and dazzling hopes
<br />To watch them all dissolve and then fade down
<br />The time will come for me to sigh and say
<br />No, in fact I did not think of you today
<br />Or the day before the day before
<br />I’ve let you leave me slowly, but for sure.
<br />
<br />______________________________
<br />
<br />
<br />In Yazd at my Aunt Pooran’s house I could never sleep with the mosquitoes puncturing holes into the nighttime quiet, so instead I told myself stories. All of that has left me now. My Aunt Pooran sold her house three summers ago and the mosquitoes don’t come anymore. Sometimes I wish they would. I got used to the bug spray smell and even now it welcomes back those memories, warm and soft-skinned in the light. I have learned: everyone leaves you in some way. My Aunt Pooran turned bitter after her husband died and in that way, she has left me. Still I think of her often. Especially today while standing in my room my ears quivered alive with a familiar sound: A mosquito, like a broken apostrophe, flitted noisily across the surface of the glassy air. Before, I would have fought it with my slipper. Now I barely flinch. It’s funny how the right memory can attach a quiet sweetness to even the most annoying of things. Mosquitoes: long summers at my Aunt Pooran’s house in Yazd. Now, neither the house nor the city exist. The government towed away most towns with its militia-men and guns and sacks of rotten blood. Everything leaves you, in its own way. Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-9527777329064915072010-10-23T15:30:00.000-07:002010-10-23T15:31:37.904-07:00Thoughts from an Iranian GrandmotherI will plead yes! when I mean <strong><em>no</em></strong>. My lipstick might match my shoes: neutral. My hair will match my voice: veiled. Someday I will laugh as he unfastens the sticky-tape and lets his diapers fall. He is 82. Years, not days. One day I will tell him NO. But that day, like the others, might not ever come. My words live through kitchen utensils: the wooden-chop voices my complaints. He stopped hearing long ago. There is car outside, it is waiting for me. I must buy the cantaloupes before they are all snatched--he likes them honey-sweet and supple, milky like licks from a cow’s broad tongue. I am not going to regret the day I married you because that would mean I would then regret each day afterwards that I did not divorce you, and my life is not a chain of “what-ifs.” Still, I wear deep tunnels in my tongue where the curse words go, when I long to set them free. It is too late. Somewhere, the skies are a pale blue like dreams that make you squint and then the sun a hole in the sky that shifts, from one sidewalk to another.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-67810513101528571822010-07-01T22:46:00.001-07:002010-07-01T22:48:58.561-07:00The summer after he turned 83 my grandfather had three women visit him throughout the week. The first, Maria, stood tall and sturdy with a long nose and a uni-brow. She was from Pakistan and often spoke of the warm weather that smelled sweetly of boiled nectarines and her parakeet--that I imagined, secretly--resembled her in more ways than one--in more ways than their shared tendency to explode into chatter. The second visitor was Sima. She always dressed in bright, cotton shirts and jeans tight around the thigh. She always dressed and smelled nicely, and stopped before and after her visits to talk to me as I walked through the kitchen in search of something to eat. The third visitor was Monica and I most enjoyed the way she spoke, because she had lived in Buenos Aires for most of her life and therefore spoke in a wandering way, as if her words were finished before she had thought them up, and longed to race to the door and leave. Thankfully, Monica herself was not that way because she stayed for the longest out of the three.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-74113216036346263982010-07-01T22:20:00.001-07:002010-07-01T22:24:03.721-07:00My dear grandfather, milky-breasted and quiet, prickly chin hairs give him away, digging into my chin as we try to cheek-kiss before bedtime, I will lead him to his bedroom, balancing a bowlful of cheerios and a glass of red wine, the smells swirl together and are warm and fermenting. I trace the bulge of his belly in my mind. He is fading away. It’s funny and amusing how we slip from one mold to another. Before, he flaunted a crispy orange tan and pastel polos. He ate lunches on the patio next to the palm trees, with the sun white-hot. Now he sits in his room, the humidity pours from the carpets and lingers above his shoulders, scooting in to his nostrils and encouraging my head hairs to uncurl in frizzy contemplation. My dear grandfather, you are so weak now, nodding through dinner because Parkinson’s secured its hold, and grease drips into your mustache and slinks its way on your knees. I watch you smile, teeth broken, waiting for sleep. You fall asleep with a lamb chop in one hand.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-16493407431747046872010-07-01T22:12:00.000-07:002010-07-01T22:13:26.872-07:00Small, Crooked ThingsI ate breakfast with my grandparents today. My grandmother sat beside me with two halves of whole wheat pita and an oily lump of cheese. She looked at me in between bites while my grandfather nodded through his coffee from across the table, his nose squished like an arrow pointing down drawing attention to his gut, pale and sagging, barely concealed by the thin shirt. My grandfather struggled to remember the name of a movie he watched four years ago and really enjoyed. For about eight minutes they argued about the main actor in the film.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-361894203025656642010-04-02T18:17:00.000-07:002010-04-02T18:18:00.706-07:00The sky is flat and blue<br />I feel very hot in my wool sweater<br />I feel like Iran <br />The country, not the boy<br />I feel hot and dry<br />My tongue is sobbing in my mouth<br />It is wet with old<br />Saliva<br />I look out of my window and see<br />Stabs of green and pricks of yellow<br />All over, spread everywhere<br />So beautiful. And I<br /><br />miss you.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-7684745993230694642010-03-15T12:39:00.000-07:002010-03-15T12:40:56.281-07:00Five people in my living room:<br />Short, asian<br />Tall, asian<br />Chubby, asian<br />Pretty, asian<br />Skinny, white <br />Pitching water bottles at one another <br />Where their balls sag <br />Except for the fourth one<br />(pretty, asian)<br />Who sits<br />Hand planted near her vagina<br />Weeping after laughing<br />She is so pink her panty line might explodeMina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-34536315324965831832010-03-15T12:37:00.001-07:002010-03-15T12:37:59.517-07:00I am<br />the only one who now can see<br /><br />past the swelling, tangerine sunrise<br />And the scatter of chubby stars, to where<br />My father slumps, easing sleep from his eyes<br />With knuckles, rough and pink, while my mother<br />Hums a warm, liquid tune of a long-lost life.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-7743968306188618152010-03-15T12:35:00.001-07:002010-03-15T12:36:17.522-07:00My tree, revisitedno attachments: all things go<br />Fi ve cle an chunks<br />across the lawn<br />one morning on my way<br />outside.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-92203294087205855652010-03-15T12:34:00.001-07:002010-03-15T12:35:09.936-07:00Hot-pink summers provide <br />Tan-crisp faces<br />Pockets scratchy with sand<br />and heart-biting, igniting images <br />of boys in bookstores, in buses<br />Stooped <br /> over novels with jagged names<br /><br />These darlings invite <br />lavender-pink daydreams <br />to feed the fat vacancies. <br />We imagine pathsm(cr)ashing <br />Love-sparks will zip free<br />So we, too, can leap <br /><br />Then--<br />The heart-hack of beautiful boys<br />Who feign interest just to prove they can<br />Seduce us into a face-slam<br />With a pole,<br />Or an ouch- slip into a <br />ditch.<br /><br />While rubbing raw bruises<br />And shrugging off wormy <br />dirt clods,<br />We will glance at them--strong--a phoenix<br />born from the ashes of heart-burn<br /><br />And think:<br />Did the lumps in our throats betray our careless expressions?Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-91413773121704556282010-03-15T12:26:00.000-07:002010-03-15T12:32:47.655-07:00I remember<br />Long, liquid afternoons inside my grandparents'<br />Shiraz home. My sisters and I<br />Skipped the spiral staircase, while my grandfather, small and round,<br />Wob-bled behind. And those slow nights of potato salad on hot bread:<br />I ripped out doughy middles and formed heaps on my plate. Then my grand-mother<br />glided past, warning me to<br />Feed the cats and feel the hunger<br />That poked their insides blue.<br />I am nothing<br />Without photos of my mother, my father<br />My parents<br />At the wedding my mother's hair curtseyed<br />My father still wore his hair<br />Proud and black and frosting-thick<br />With their thumbs they scooped up cake<br />But fed promises. Years later,<br />My mother<br />Is spinning away and<br />Unwinding. There are bits of her<br />Creased<br />In the laundry room, near the plastic baskets and the dirty bras,<br />Like mango holders. There are bits of her roaming with the house flies,<br />From one watermelon chunk to another.<br />And there are bits of her shivering in the May breeze<br />That smells like tulips and warm<br />pool water.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-45191275699444323352010-03-06T14:26:00.001-08:002010-03-06T14:27:05.228-08:00My TreeMy tree--the one,<br />Richly-rooted--<br />With leaves that dripped<br />Fresh shade. I found in<br />Five clean chunks across the lawn<br />This morning on my way<br />Outside. Its gold-hue<br />Hips still burned so<br />Beautiful.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-85716805273787632952010-03-06T14:11:00.001-08:002010-03-06T14:12:00.961-08:00Poem written as I slipped into sleep...I dream bright, tangerine dreams.<br />The inside hollowed out,<br />Crammed with French fries and<br />A sticky stoop of licorice string. I once roamed<br />Those smooth-water streets, where children drifted cool and quiet. They wore<br />Entire shells in their hair, while twigs danced from their ankles. I am slowly<br />Spinning away and sinking down. There are entire light bulbs dedicated to the hope<br />That we can see without our eyes alone.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-66537417824743146642010-02-11T15:01:00.001-08:002010-03-06T14:09:14.560-08:00If one designer inspired me to dream, it was you, Alexander McQueenI was seated at the coffee table<br />It was a clean, February morning<br />Cold yet inviting. The sky<br />flat and blue.<br />I peeled my first orange of the day<br />The smell sang citrus<br /><br />My phone quivered on the table<br />I received the new, and learned<br />That<br />They discovered you in a London apartment<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Your </span>London apartment.<br />I was just<br /><br />about to finish peeling my orange.<br />There are still bits of it stuck to the smooth<br />Insides of my fingernails.<br />I can smell you, now, wherever I<br />Go. You smell like oranges. I know this now,<br />I didn’t know it before.Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-17607864872075659532010-02-09T02:32:00.000-08:002010-03-06T14:12:58.366-08:00#2<span style="font-family:times new roman;">___2</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Always, I am muddied by memories:</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">My father unfolding on top his bed</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">My mother--sweet-sour lemon-candy--</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Rising from morning without her smile. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">There are caramel-crackling images:</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">My two sisters twirling, amid a whirl</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Of gushing-glitter noise. There are cloud dusts</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">On their heads, dripping deep into their eyes.</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">I am the only one who now can see </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">past the swelling, tangerine sunrise </span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">And the scatter of chubby stars, to where</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">my father slumps, easing sleep from his eyes</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">With knuckles, rough and pink, while my mother</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Hums a warm, liquid tune of a long-lost life.<br /><br /></span>Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-72300561806441130852010-02-03T19:45:00.000-08:002010-02-03T19:48:03.810-08:00<span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: times new roman;">Being young will never get old<br />So forget all those lies that you’ve been<br />told<br />Suck in the sun<br />Then exchange numbers with the<br />Tulips<br /></span></span>Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-27663811763134579642010-02-02T22:39:00.000-08:002010-02-08T00:59:08.177-08:00Are you able, girl?<span style="font-family:times new roman;">That girl wears the clam between her legs</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Sticky</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">She boasts no-underwear </span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Stretching her liquid limbs to the sky</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Of chirping fluorescence</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Overhead, she is like a shaky China doll</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Of cucumber fingers</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">So pale and so cold</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">That you mistook them for ice-cube-kisses beneath</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">The table</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Are you able, girl?</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">To imagine yourself without a boy</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Sucking on your hips with his finger-</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">tips</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">He holds on tight, for the ride</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">It feels so good to be inside</span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Are you able, girl?</span>Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-44954774341131376322010-02-02T22:32:00.000-08:002010-02-02T22:35:15.696-08:00I have gone so far for you<br />That my spine croaks a sunset tune<br />Cloud-wisps color my hair white, then blue<br />And rainstorms stud my lashes with dew<br /><br />I have gone so far but I still must go<br />Swallowing tulips, lightning, and fields of snow<br />Along with hearts of trees and the essence of leaves<br />Before they murmur to the floor<br /><br />I have gone so far for you<br />That my knees and my feet are through<br />They spit and they screech at you<br />Their words boil and brown a bloody stew<br /><br />The cypress trees are tall and blue like you<br />Their limbs stretch towards the tangerine sun<br />Together they whisper words I know well<br />That many moons will give birth before I am doneMina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8611136345474169742.post-55053894179667029132010-01-23T00:33:00.000-08:002010-01-23T00:36:52.830-08:00Sticky summers provide<br />the usual souvenirs:<br />Tan, crisp faces<br />pockets scratchy with sand<br />and countless heart-biting, igniting images<br />of boys in bookstores and in buses<br />stooped over novels with jagged names<br />lips sparkling with pricks of blood.<br /><br />These darling invite lavender-pink dreams<br />to feed the fat vacancies between our thoughts and<br />tirelessly, we imagine when our paths might crash<br />arousing love-sparks to gallop free<br />so we, too, might<br />leap.<br /><br />Soon we will experience<br />the slap-sting of beautiful boys<br />who feign interest just to prove they can<br />seduce us into a face-slam<br />with a pole,<br />or an ouch-slip into a ditch.<br />While rubbing our bruises<br />and brushing off wormy dirt clods,<br />We will glance at him, suddenly strong, a phoenix born from the ashes of heart-burn<br /><br />And think:<br />Did the lumps in our throats betray our careless expressions?Mina Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12158020398100608119noreply@blogger.com0