Bamboo, Bride of The Forest<\/b><\/p>\n
Bamboo, bride of the forest\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n the cymbals of winds\u00a0 \u00a0 & \u00a0 your fine\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n many knees<\/span><\/p>\n ripens with the autumn\u2019s mouth.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The bush rat i chased,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n found refuge in you;\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n a border set under these roots<\/span><\/p>\n cannot be trampled on.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Your belly button hoists<\/span><\/p>\n all mysteries into the silvered sky<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0as the crows flies\u00a0 &\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n as the mamba strikes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Do not tame me like the panda.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I am not the carnassial,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n protruding.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The seed of a swollen hunger quakes\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I call the dearth in a testimony<\/span><\/p>\n of pyre. Let the forest uncoil\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n like a smile of smokes, let it yield<\/span><\/p>\n my quarry, I pray.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0I caked the forest with flame. My\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n hunger ate something bigger<\/span><\/p>\n than lunch.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n A squirrel panicked\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n at my feet, I can\u2019t speak of its anguish\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n lipping an uncertain regret in me<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n cache into a rainstick spent in the incense\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n of hunger. \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Hollow, supple in the ash<\/span><\/p>\n of sighs, burning the forest\u2019s grief into me.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n A pellet of unendingness\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n billows between us; the squirrel & bamboo<\/span><\/p>\n the fire & I.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n A Mini Thunder Across My Thumb, 2005<\/b><\/p>\n The swinging bench with rust growing<\/span><\/p>\n in its iron hold, the aged palm tree\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n with ashen hands, weeping<\/span><\/p>\n into carpets of amaranth & goatweed<\/span><\/p>\n along the Prestige Road, whose summer crown<\/span><\/p>\n the dim dun\u00a0 of the moon sits upon together<\/span><\/p>\n with night jars, marsh owls and other<\/span><\/p>\n silhouettes of nightly things, with the anthem<\/span><\/p>\n of crickets filling the evening breeze.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This place wraps me into 2005 and there is us, young,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n fresh to the wonder of hormones, perfect, except that\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n the memory faults the present in a swollen tongue<\/span><\/p>\n of corrosion and neglect, night birds in lieu<\/span><\/p>\n of morning birds, and the palm tree was small\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n enough for nine-years-olds to rip into its throat\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n and pluck ripe teneras]<\/span> In one early adventure of digging deep\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n for a redder bunch, a spine tore through my right thumb\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n but what I didn\u2019t notice until the following morning were two<\/span><\/p>\n fresh scars, each as fuchsia as the inside of dianthus.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n One on my lower lip. The other on the thumb.<\/span><\/p>\n How hard can it be to discern blood from\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n a messy drip of the red juice? What disarmed\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n the hurt into oblivion? The shades of fronds? The savouring<\/span><\/p>\n of raw red oil? The delicious wound of a first kiss?<\/span><\/p>\n The wonder of two mouths eating a fruit?<\/span> The kernels\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n of some memories fragment without grace,<\/span><\/p>\n reaping shards, scattered & whole,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n the suspiral of first kiss and glorified scars.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Ruins of Neglect\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n The funnel of perennial grief, this body,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Burning itself in the wake of history\u2014\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n In one corner, someone caught the ocean\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Inside a dragnet, a pull on the Celsius scale.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Put the measure in your mouth and spell f i r e\u2014\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n In another corner, the skirts of Amazon\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Caught a wild flame, a pregnant porcupine\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Sits between the intersection of dews & ashes,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Her body, weary of needling up an unheard protest\u2014\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Greta Thunberg holds thunder in her tongue\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n