The Sun and Her Flowers Read online

  excited and terrified for what’s to come

  he smiles

  knows this is what satisfaction looks like

  i am a switchboard

  he is the circuits

  my hips move with his—rhythmic

  my voice isn’t my own when i moan—it is music

  like fingers on a violin string

  he sparks enough electricity within me to power a city

  when we finish i look right at him

  and tell him

  that was magic

  when i walked into the coffee shop and saw you. my body did not react like it had the first time. i waited for my heart to abandon me. for my legs to freeze up. to fall to the ground crying at your sight. nothing happened. there was no connection or movement inside when we locked eyes. you looked like a regular guy with your regular clothes and regular coffee. nothing profound about you. i don’t give myself enough credit. my body must have cleansed itself of you long ago. must have gotten tired of me behaving like i’d lost the best thing to have happened. and wrung the insecurities out while i was busy wallowing in pity. that day i had no makeup on. my hair was all over the place. i was wearing my brother’s old t-shirt and pajama pants. yet i felt like a gleaming siren. a mermaid. i did a little dance in the car while driving home. even though we were both under the same roof of that coffee shop. i was still solar systems away from you.

  the orange trees refused to blossom

  unless we bloomed first

  when we met

  they wept tangerines

  can’t you tell

  the earth has waited its whole life for this

  - celebration

  why am i always running in circles

  between wanting you to want me

  and when you want me

  deciding it is too emotionally naked

  for me to live with

  why do i make loving me so difficult

  as if you should never have to witness

  the ghosts i have tucked under my breast

  i used to be more open

  when it came to matters like this my love

  - if only we’d met when i was that willing

  i could not contain myself any longer

  i ran to the ocean

  in the middle of the night

  and confessed my love for you to the water

  as i finished telling her

  the salt in her body became sugar

  (ode to sobha singh’s sohni mahiwal)

  i say maybe this is a mistake. maybe we need more than love to make this work.

  you place your lips on mine. when our faces are buzzing with the ecstasy of kissing you say tell me that isn’t right. and as much as i’d like to think with my head. my racing heart is all that makes sense. there. right there is the answer you’re looking for. in my loss of breath. my lack of words. my silence. my inability to speak means you’ve filled my stomach with so many butterflies that even if this is a mistake. it could only be right to be this wrong with you.

  a

  man

  who cries

  - a gift

  if i’m going to share my life with a partner

  it would be foolish not to ask myself

  twenty years from now

  is this person going to be

  someone i still laugh with

  or am i just distracted by their charm

  do i see us evolving into

  new people by the decade

  or does the growing ever come to a pause

  i don’t want to be distracted

  by the looks or the money

  i want to know if they pull

  the best or the worst out of me

  deep at the core are our values the same

  in thirty years will we still

  jump into bed like we’re twenty

  can i picture us in old age

  conquering the world

  like we’ve got young blood

  running in our veins

  - checklist

  what is it with you and sunflowers he asks

  i point to the field of yellow outside

  sunflowers worship the sun i tell him

  only when it arrives do they rise

  when the sun leaves

  they bow their heads in mourning

  that is what the sun does to those flowers

  it’s what you do to me

  - the sun and her flowers

  sometimes

  i stop myself from

  saying the words out loud

  as if leaving my mouth too often

  might wear them down

  - i love you

  the most important conversations

  we’ll have are with our fingers

  when yours nervously graze mine

  for the first time during dinner

  they’ll tighten with fear

  when you ask to see me again next week

  but as soon as i say yes

  they’ll stretch out in ease

  when they grasp one another

  while we’re beneath the sheets

  the two of us will pretend

  we’re not weak in the knees

  when i get angry

  they’ll pulse with bitter cries

  but when they tremble for forgiveness

  you’ll see what apologies look like

  and when one of us is dying

  on a hospital bed at eighty-five

  your fingers will grip mine

  to say things words can’t describe

  - fingers

  this morning

  i told the flowers

  what i’d do for you

  and they blossomed

  there is no place

  i end and you begin

  when your body

  is in my body

  we are one person

  - sex

  if i had to walk to get to you

  it would take eight hundred and twenty-six hours

  on bad days i think about it

  what i might do if the apocalypse comes

  and the planes stop flying

  there is so much time to think

  so much empty space wanting to be consumed

  but no intimacy around to consume it

  it feels like being stuck at a train station

  waiting and waiting and waiting

  for the one with your name on it

  when the moon rises on this coast

  but the sun still burns shamelessly on yours

  i crumble knowing even our skies are different

  we have been together so long

  but have we really been together if

  your touch has not held me long enough

  to imprint itself on my skin

  i try my hardest to stay present

  but without you here

  everything at its best

  is only mediocre

  - long distance

  i am

  made of water

  of course i am emotional

  they should feel like home

  a place that grounds your life

  where you go to take the day off

  - the one

  the moon is responsible

  for pulling tides

  out of still water

  darling

  i am the still water

  and you are the moon

  the right one does not

  stand in your way

  they make space for you

  to step forward

  when y
ou are

  full

  and i am

  full

  we are two suns

  your voice does to me

  what autumn does to trees

  you call to say hello

  and my clothes fall naturally

  together we are an endless conversation

  when death

  takes my hand

  i will hold you with the other

  and promise to find you

  in every lifetime

  - commitment

  it was as though

  someone had slid ice cubes

  down the back of my shirt

  - orgasm

  you have

  been

  inside me

  before

  - another lifetime

  god must have kneaded you and i

  from the same dough

  rolled us out as one on the baking sheet

  must have suddenly realized

  how unfair it was

  to put that much magic in one person

  and sadly split that dough in two

  how else is it that

  when i look in the mirror

  i am looking at you

  when you breathe

  my own lungs fill with air

  that we just met but we

  have known each other our whole lives

  if we were not made as one to begin with

  - our souls are mirrors

  to be

  two legs

  on one body

  - a relationship

  you must have a

  honeycomb

  for a heart

  how else

  could a man

  be this sweet

  if you got any more beautiful

  the sun would leave its place

  and come for you

  - the chase

  it has been one of the greatest and most difficult years of my life. i learned everything is temporary. moments. feelings. people. flowers. i learned love is about giving. everything. and letting it hurt. i learned vulnerability is always the right choice because it is easy to be cold in a world that makes it so very difficult to remain soft. i learned all things come in twos. life and death. pain and joy. salt and sugar. me and you. it is the balance of the universe. it has been the year of hurting so bad but living so good. making friends out of strangers. making strangers out of friends. learning mint chocolate chip ice cream will fix just about everything. and for the pains it can’t there will always be my mother’s arms. we must learn to focus on warm energy. always. soak our limbs in it and become better lovers to the world. for if we can’t learn to be kind to each other how will we ever learn to be kind to the most desperate parts of ourselves.

  the universe took its time on you

  crafted you to offer the world

  something different from everyone else

  when you doubt

  how you were created

  you doubt an energy greater than us both

  - irreplaceable

  when the first woman spread her legs

  to let the first man in

  what did he see

  when she led him down the hallway

  toward the sacred room

  what sat waiting

  what shook him so deeply

  that all confidence shattered

  from then on

  the first man

  watched the first woman

  every night and day

  built a cage to keep her in

  so she could sin no more

  he set fire to her books

  called her witch

  and shouted whore

  until the evening came

  when his tired eyes betrayed him

  the first woman noticed it

  as he unwillingly fell asleep

  the quiet humming

  the drumming

  a knocking between her legs

  a doorbell

  a voice

  a pulse

  asking her to open up

  and off her hand went running

  down the hall

  toward the sacred room

  she found

  god

  the magician’s wand

  the snake’s tongue

  sitting inside her smiling

  - when the first woman drew magic with her fingers

  i will no longer

  compare my path to others

  - i refuse to do a disservice to my life

  i am the product of all the ancestors getting together

  and deciding these stories need to be told

  many tried

  but failed to catch me

  i am the ghost of ghosts

  everywhere and nowhere

  i am magic tricks

  within magic within magic

  none have figured out

  i am a world wrapped in worlds

  folded in suns and moons

  you can try but

  you won’t get those hands on me

  upon my birth

  my mother said

  there is god in you

  can you feel her dancing

  (ode to matisse’s dance)

  as a father of three daughters

  it would have been normal

  for him to push marriage on us

  this has been the narrative for

  the women in my culture for hundreds of years

  instead he pushed education

  knowing it would set us free

  in a world that wanted to contain us

  he made sure that we learned

  to walk independently

  there are far too many mouths here

  but not enough of them are worth

  what you’re offering

  give yourself to a few

  and to those few

  give heavily

  - invest in the right people

  i am of the earth

  and to the earth i shall return once more

  life and death are old friends

  and i am the conversation between them

  i am their late-night chatter

  their laughter and tears

  what is there to be afraid of

  if i am the gift they give to each other

  this place never belonged to me anyway

  i have always been theirs

  to hate

  is an easy lazy thing

  but to love

  takes strength

  everyone has

  but not all are

  willing to practice

  beautiful brown girl

  your thick hair is a mink coat not all can afford

  beautiful brown girl

  you hate the hyperpigmentation

  but your skin can’t help

  carrying as much sun as possible

  you are a magnet for the light

  unibrow—the bridging of two worlds

  vagina—so much darker than the rest of you

  cause it is trying to hide a gold mine

  you will have dark circles too early

  —appreciate the halos

  beautiful brown girl

  you pull god out of their bellies

  look down at your body

  whisper

  there is no home like you

  - thank you

  learning to not envy

  someone else’s blessings

  is what grace looks like
r />   i am the first woman in my lineage with freedom of choice. to craft her future whichever way i choose. say what is on my mind when i want to. without the whip of the lash. there are hundreds of firsts i am thankful for. that my mother and her mother and her mother did not have the privilege of feeling. what an honor. to be the first woman in the family who gets to taste her desires. no wonder i am starving to fill up on this life. i have generations of bellies to eat for. the grandmothers must be howling with laughter. huddled around a mud stove in the afterlife. sipping on steaming glasses of milky masala chai. how wild it must be for them to see one of their own living so boldly.

  (ode to amrita sher-gil’s village scene 1938)

  trust your body

  it reacts to right and wrong

  better than your mind does

  - it is speaking to you

  i stand

  on the sacrifices

  of a million women before me

  thinking

  what can i do

  to make this mountain taller

  so the women after me

  can see farther

  - legacy

  when i go from this place

  dress the porch with garlands

  as you would for a wedding my dear

  pull the people from their homes

  and dance in the streets

  when death arrives

  like a bride at the aisle

  send me off in my brightest clothing

  serve ice cream with rose petals to our guests

  there’s no reason to cry my dear

  i have waited my whole life

  for such a beauty to take

  my breath away

  when i go

  let it be a celebration

  for i have been here