June 1998

for my dad.

the alarm went off too early.

like a gunshot,

ripping through the night,

and chests,

through my flag,

my father’s dreams.

it woke him before the sun could,

just as it was getting to the good part,

 

this is the one where the baby,

fast asleep on his chest

with fists balled up

learns her tongue from her mother

her land. this is the one where

she speaks it the way she breathes it,

instinctively.

the one where her mouth isn’t

weighed down by

assimilation.

this is the one he is woken from,

taken from,

for twenty-something years.

is that long enough to think your life wasted?

i hope, seeing me now,

that it has been worth it.

and me,

i bent and broke borders

to make a single home

of the circumstances.

© Yasmina Nuny