Neda Zahraie

You Seem to Have Called

You must stop
making missiles
if you want me
to talk to you.

25 December 2007

The Turks killed 150 Kurds today
27 more people died in Northern Baghdad
in a bombing of some sort
27 according to New York times
33 according to ABC News,
Cyrus tore a lip  
and a nose and
an eye on the slopes in Utah,
Toyota announces  
it plans to sell 9.8 million cars in 08 
An ambitious number
Considering the pretty lame sate 
of US economy,
The girls stayed home today
My mom gave them facials

Egg yolk, honey, olive oil 
fifteen minutes and then  
We have to moisturize, 
Nobody talks about the war these days, 
It is high-time for Iraqis to buy cars Toyotas 
and GMs And then some peacetime arms,
I imagine doctors holding 
flashlights over Cyrus’ right eye 
I imagine he is mumbling “yes” 
That he is seeing the light.

Mourner

She searches the obituary section for names
of relations she can wear black for.

—N.A.Z.M.

I am the mourner
The mourner of past wars
The mourner of crashed cars

I am the mourner of mob punishment
In the News on the Street — John Meints
Tarred & Feathered 1918 Opposing war bonds

I am the mourner of coup d’états—Blackened as the shroud they found fit for us — the mourner of payoffs by Imperialism's big pockets derailing history

I am the mourner of executions, mourner
of Solitary confinement the mourner of my
Somatized order, swollen legs leaky bowls forced migration

I am the mourner of planes on friendly fire
Of trillion dollar plans for the private dweller,
The bulbous alcoholic nose of the bank teller

Skin peeling off the bare feet of the train rider
I mourn the out-of-touch bystander The University
Scholar that radical-lookin' dogmatic calculator

Others amounted to something
A celebration went on right over there
I grew dark outward—inward mourning

The deep sleep of reason

In Memory Space

Meat grinder Child's finger

Walking in wet snow Fereshteh St. Copper five coin for a shared taxi ride from baazar to the next bridge

Radio alarm school morning show
Whistling the theme years after

Crows gathering in autumn on a tree
Fight of the alley cats

Afternoon nap Cockroaches at night

Electricity outage

Electricity back on

Sermon in the background Swinging broken glass door

Scorpion tea poisoning of a household legend Pounding a walnut with a stone

"Namaki!" the afternoon call for dry bread Ghanat cool clean water running by the yard

The boiling of rice A large gathering

Hospital heart Artery bursting

Fireworks ascending in the shape of a V
Dawn of war

Driving on gravel Nausea of backseat

A voice on the line asking, "who's home?" Reversed direction mid coiled cord

Rotary phone dial Vibrating beyond molecules

In memory space

A place to begin never to end