She said, “Lift.”
I remember being told to soak
myself in unreason—that words
fall to pieces because the wind
needs her role; not everything
must be a weight to grunt over.
In you, amber formed to gem-
stones that I plucked and ate
like strawberries, that I carried
with promise—I floated in
the unlikeliest of ways—
your glass foaming inside
my throat. Moving forward
is pleasant when the belly
feels warm and full. Now, as change
calls, I am not Hasnah; I cannot
remove you from me in crystal
tears. I can only cough
a red glow up and drop
it on a star—each retch
an inch closer to Earth
receiving the soles of my feet,
a polished memory, though false,
laid neatly on a table.
She said, “Let go—I’m a memory. I’m not real.”
I’ve counted every single hair
you left in my room, gathered
them up, and scattered them
in the grass. It is not enough
to wash away the blood;
the wood must be burned too—
each carpet fiber must be picked,
each nail lifted, each floorboard
taken to the pile. Everything you
touched and touched you, smells
and tastes of you, will be eaten
by the sky. In the end, I reshape
matter and mass in the yard. I’m
mad, making an effigy in the dirt—
my last good look at you—and digging
for roots, anything that will keep me
tethered. Anything is a ritual if prayer
comes before practice. I cut off
the swath of me that was taken when we
lay in bed, fantasizing a future
that failed to materialize. It is okay.
Earth will retake her ashes—us too
in time—but no memory is tangible
and whenever I try to pin it down,
the location thins to clouds
in my grasps. You are unobtainable,
anima trapped inside a bottle, and the lid
burrows into me with each twist.