Silent Landscape III by Aisha Rajar. Image courtesy of ArtChowk Gallery.
Eight weeks in, I folded the list, incomplete,
I saved the floor plan of my body for later, maybe,
as I hovered in the grip of comatose wings,
floated into my office, color-coded tulips
lined the streets, pomegranate seeds
exploded in pots of glacial water, heavy
pink blossoms bursting in Brooklyn,
puppets, a scarlet moon, every word
I exhaled a joke, I carried the collapsed
away from the platform, and at the end
of each night the same question dangling,
wasn’t this blessing worth the waiting,
the next day enough to forget Monday morning,
immersed in the delicate aspects of beauty,
I said no, not this moment,
but still I glided through music, puzzle pieces,
fitting rooms, forced my legs through the ocean,
always sailing, like molecules,
whatever swam in my veins was steady;
kind voices, caring lyrics: no, not this,
so I unfolded the list, but pleasure maladjusted
left me inactive; I continued drifting through stone,
through the space between landforms,
to another coast, poised on a stranger’s roof,
an outline of lush masses between mountains,
emeralds and orchids not vanishing in sunset,
eternal spring in January before me,
the mango slices like crescent pieces;
no, not even then, as my skull absorbed
the salt stored; I turned around
to a reclining body, it began to curve,
making a small room for me, something funny,
I bend into the concave of his chest;
in MedellÃn the same query dangling,
his heartbeat familiar, the pulse splits concrete,
I laugh with him too, borrow his lungs:
yes, I respond to nobody
Mehrnoosh Torbatnejad was born and raised in New York. Her poetry has appeared in The Commonline Journal, The Coe Review, Kudzu House Quarterly, The Chiron Review, and is forthcoming in Passages North, Stillwater Review, Orange Coast Review, apt, and Riprap Journal. She currently lives in New York and practices matrimonial law.
