لا
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nej
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ei
non
Nein
Αριθ.
Babu
פלסטיני
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Nincs
no
いいえ
아무도
nei
نخیر
Nr
não
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нет
no
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ไม่มี
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کوئی

Now available in your language of choice

bullseye

Before I was a girl, I was an aged crone.

A wise and withered ghost;

exhaling all my years,

deflating at the front.

Before I was a girl, I was a man.

I was with power and esteem

and honor.

I spoke and planted thoughts

for bloom.

Before I was a girl I was an afterthought.

A consequence of pleasure

and an object,

weighted by sin.

Before I was a girl

I was black and blue,

a baby soft with hot, hot irons.

A fire breathing, slow witted

pillowcase strewn with

last night’s face.

Before I was your girl I was your mother.

I hung like bells calling you to tea.

I hung like heads,

leadened with shame.

And I gazed at you with hate

like love,

and tucked you into sleep.

When I was no longer a phantom,

I was a form.

Moving fast as light,

a rhythm in your chest,

the spindle pulsing to 2,2 time

plucking and pulling the thread

to harden the heart.

Before I was a girl,

I was aged by my heart.

But now I am a child,

born from a jealous mouth

nothing ever more.

a less than three day grace

you've given me your words
to shape in my mind
and form themselves
into arms, against you.
And though they are only products,
of hackneyed thought
and ridiculed hands,
they mark your memory
a nameless epithet
for an empty grave.

Autun Cathedral (St. Lazare), west tympanum, Last Judgment. c. 1130-1135. Autun, France

recreational trips to the airport

I always feel okay in airports. Everyone there is a traveler, no one is rooted in some airport culture. It's personally isolating, collaboratively nomadic. It's easier to define one's character in a suspended state. Routine and culture are too often confused. In the class I visited today, they were talking about character without context; how people separate themselves from a collective past to become individuals. I understand that. If we live too devoutly in tune with our history, we are simply living the past, reaffirming a point we already know