POETRY

I encounter you

When I am half asleep

And you are just

Beginning to be

Half awake

Across this earth of nation-less hope

Sleepy and hungry,

Mirages made out of olives

Futures in the shape of pomegranite trees

Portraits of head scarf covered grandmothers

With hands rough from years of chopping sabzi

Pearls from the Caspian Sea

A trail of saffron, sorrow, and pride

In case we forget the way home

Farsi class lifeboats

In oceans of /tha/ not /va/ sounds

We watch you from our CNN’s and ABC’s

Hundreds and thousands of sweaty, brave Heart-pounding protesting you

In our living rooms

Flattened on our flat screen TV’s

Laptop computers and cell phone technologies

Wrapped in green bandages

Stained by your own red blood from the street

Was it you that they shot?

So far away – this alphabet of

Hamburger helper and Idaho potatoes

Becomes confusing

Your pulse is foreign to me

Not that I want it to be,

But when was the last time,

I sat in a park with you

On the edge of a fountain

In central Tehran

With faloodeh or gojeh torsh

We make kabob in California too

I can’t see you in the smoke anymore

Why are there internet directories

Of executed Iranians

Keeping count

Between barrels of oil

And dead bodies from the late 1980’s

I want to scream but its midnight here

And my roommate is asleep

I thought – it was you,

From the overcoat you wore

On the bus ride to Shiraz

The Ash in a giant silver pot

Ancient paintings etched on the ceilings

I am still a million miles away

On the Manhattan bound train

Searching for organic face wash

And a tax refund

I heard you are in Abadan,

Like sand slipping through my hand.