“Basmah” means “smile” in Arabic. That’s what my ex-wife named our daughter; she said that maybe she could teach me how to smile. Our marriage lasted for eight years. I tried my best.
ESSAY
MICRO
THE ADDICT AS A DOG WALKER
I am
being eaten, leash
and all.
BACK OF THE ENVELOPE
Papaavetam / Water People
I am not comparing myself to Creator; I am only saying I am made of water; I am only saying I flow to the sea.
ART
All Hail the Queens of the Qing Dynasty
The history surrounding me was moving, a string of stories of restricted freedom and female agency told through clothes, household items, and artwork—including one painting attributed to the powerful Empress Dowager Cixi, who left a trace of her thumbprint in ink.
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Or can my heart argue I’m not, is home a true north / that never leaves you? Maybe if I could remember the word / it would be worth something.
Poem in Which I Am Too Political to Read at Your School
O, ancient / wonder, rose of unsullied joy, I sing / to the majesty of your sun-loved face / —your color so pure, petal fine as wing, / leaf’s thin veins a natural puzzle of lace.
Men Paid Me To Eat
The first time was in college. A boyfriend, or something between a boyfriend and a hookup, asked me if he could eat some peanut butter off my stomach. “You mean, off my boobs?” I said. And he said, “No, I really want to eat it off your belly while I squeeze it.”
ghost x garden x grow
I had to haul my baby sister out of the blood-drenched soil once I was done watering life back into the wet, clumpy post-abortion fetal tissue she used to be. Like all babies, she kicked and screamed.
Korea Through the London Eye: Impressions
We never used the label “refugee” in our family. Perhaps because the word is insufficient for the story.
Hope and Memory
Old love is like a veil, part sunk in the ground, part swaying in air. One can neither wrap it around oneself nor carry it along. Its shadow wavers on the sands of time.
