meta-variable

the :ized is part of the celestial object      vis-à-vis the :ist she discovers that her mind also thinks       form is a super -ficial thing     ears are innately reflexive and so she listens                                     but isn’t buying the total deficiency

homogeneously an imperialized is as envious and is told to remain seated  meanwhile she attends to what extent the two worlds are fundamentally different           a.k.a one is                                                            under excessive stress

argus-eyed      ambivalent on justice       how one realigns and whether she is out of line           reads the note in trans -lation:         Only one. / The one that is more tired. / This                                                                  is the instruction.

then counting the counterintuitive              her tourist love who claimed her country       is a land of contradictions the grand Buddha    who ate his shit     her father who was                                     both revolutionary and mechanical

home simultaneously warm and at war            marching on monetarily dependent with checkpoints             deep down she finds            a voice infused / of neither hope / nor question             comparatively indicates a tenacious presence

day in and out this subject        in diction        in peace punctuates               is aware of the case for :ialism     pm writhes in her circadian rhythm             barbed wire whose                          disentanglement should be a paid position

 

Notes:

The italicized are borrowed from Ahmad Shamlu’s poem, “Anthem for the One Who Left and the One Who Stayed Behind,” translated by Jason Bahbak Mohaghegh, and some concepts discussed in this poem first appeared in Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth. From Disbound by Hajar Hussaini, forthcoming from University of Iowa Press, fall 2022. © 2022 Hajar Hussaini. Reprinted with permission of University of Iowa Press.

Source: Poetry (April 2022)