ocean

I am the blunt shards
of Ocean Vuong’s sharp words,
assembled with unoriginal thought
in forlorn fractures, wounded fractals,
and other ill and mis fitting parts.

I stare at the patch of black sky
where the moon was yesterday-
the empty corner of my mind
where words used to be, words
I prided in calling my own,
Like the moon. Invisible now
Like me in this luscious city.
Pulled down by more than gravity,
the earth of my being keeps
turning. memory's axis slants
my vision, just out of reach.
always, just out. Like the butterflies.
Fluttering fluorescence around
summer flowers I cannot name,
Like my desires. A hush descends.

The music blaring between my ears
is the truce silence and I are still
negotiating. Though neither of us
has made it to the table yet. this war
is everything, and makes nothing
of us with indelible joy and cruelty.
𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘮𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘮𝘦𝘯 𝘴𝘤𝘢𝘮𝘱𝘦𝘳?
its rainy season. the sun blots everything.
clouds feast like vultures on the bodies
of our hopes. 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘩𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘴. in plural.
while we keep working, singularly
toward our annihilation at our own hands,
𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘦𝘭𝘴𝘦.

                     And not just hands, but our
whole and wholly riddled bodies holding,
bursting out of and with, all the histories
never written, spoken or acknowledged.
Felt and shaped in out of breath whispers
exhausted from screams that don’t reach
your sound-proofed world constantly making
itself safe from, untouched by, my existence.
The shame of my silence, as of my assertions
is meant to be mine, and mine alone. So you
decree, and on some days, I refuse. But
on moonless nights like these, in the midst
of stars that are long dead, I begin to think -
How else might this end, but in a prolonged
and tired whisper. Maybe even earnest. But
not quite Eliot’s classic 𝘸𝘩𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘦𝘳. The weight
of the worlds, more deafening and silencing
than we choose to believe.

                                                     Meanwhile,
refuge lies in other people’s words and music.
Tearing us apart as much as putting together.
And the stitches on my body from the rips and
mends expose more of the histories kept hidden
by ineffective moisturizer and sun tan. Thankfully,
winter is approaching, these stories will be buried
in layers of thermals, keeping me forgetfully warm.
As seasons change, I transform. the butterfly goes
back into its cocoon. This present absence becomes
an absent presence, frigid, foggy, and comforting.
And in this seasonal obliteration, things can go on,
as before, as they always have, and as you never
forget to remind me, as they absolutely must.

friend

For a few days now,
I have noticed a pigeon
atop the iron grill
outside my window.
Yesterday it perched
by the sill awhile,
then flew back to the grill,
to stay the customary night.
My companion of nightly
contemplations and
academic writing.

Nesting in unlikely places.
finding momentary refuge,
pausing for movement,
trading beginnings for ends
and verdicts for silence.
Is that you, my grey friend, 

or me? I wonder.

a questionable inquiry

Everywhere you turn, the overcast
skies of your mind weigh you down
with endless inquiry and doubt.

To be and not to be.

What responsibility do these shoulders carry?
Or want? Or hope to finally put down?
To whom is this responsibility owed?

Can you compartmentalize yourself neatly
into slots of nature and nurture?
These desires of your heart - are they your desires?
What authorizes these desires? Or who?
What authorizes them as yours?
Where do you dwell? In what? In whom?
Who unveils you, and how do you unveil?
In what violent silences are you implicated?
Would you interrupt “collectively inherited epistemic frames”?

What structures of thought and habit bind you?
What holds you back? What takes you forward?
How do you begin to disentangle yourself?
How do you disrupt the enforced linearity?
What if you don’t? What is liberation worth?
Can you imagine equality? What does it look like – to you?

What does silence mean to you?
How do you escape the siren’s melody?
What does it mean to surrender to its song?

What is your educational ideal?
Where does your educative utopia lead you?
Who is coming along on that ride?

When were you last brave? What did it take?
Where do you look for courage?
Where do you draw the line? And when?

How do you engage with your belatedness?
How do you take responsibility for the common world?

Where might we start?
And with what whimpers do we end? And where do we linger in the interim?

in-between

Would you be willing
to speak from the fringes,
to spill from the edges,
to gaze from the margins
imagining border crossings?
Would you be willing
to wait at the gate,
to stand at the doorway,
to keep open your heart
as much as the door?

To be always on the cusp
of beginnings, and of ends,
and the in-between possibilities.

responsibility

How do we begin this – and where –
This undoing, unknotting, unmaking,
unmasking, unsilencing, unhiding?
Perhaps start with that call for help
addressed to no one in particular.
It is meant for you –
You alone, as much as you too.

Are you response-able?
What provokes your response?
To whom are you responsible?

resonance

In mythology, Echo was cursed
never to be able to express
an original word of her own.
What curses do you echo
in your acts and omissions?

Resounding silences need
spokespersons too, sometimes.
Perhaps you want to consider.

resistance

They might write of you as a hero,
for your refusal to walk with them.
I suspect they will prefer you a villain,
the rebel without an acceptable cause.
Chances are you won’t be remembered –
That might be their greatest victory.

After all memory has no market value,
And History’s account of victors
paints resistance very differently.