Cardinal Histories
a poem by Thea Abdullah
how is the past sufficient in the bludgeoning of the human bones? one cannot truly understand the tendrils stretching out from 10 years ago, or the taste of the pomegranate 8 years ago. would numbers ever add up to my heart breaking and its echo reaching you from histories away? i keep you in my pocket to use — like a compass magnetically drawn to a direction suffused by the past. honey, this life is inevitable, and i shall meet you at the end of a very dim tunnel where i shall deluge you with a feverish and sweet love! hold my hands and kneel before the Lord — ask Him to keep us at bay while I acquiesce in a past wholly insufficient to the chambers rocking us against the present. you there, i here, is a scenery the historians are entirely familiar with. we are intrepid beings, and i shatter history with a soft kiss.
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Thea Abdullah (any pronouns) resides in the Philippines as a miserable fan of Italian author Elena Ferrante.