One Day I'll Wake Up and Ask Her

by Aya Elizabeth

​

Before you knew me, my potential was

a calligram of fractured waves containing

a thousand haikus and paper cranes and

I was bee sting / cloud / broken mouth /

 

proud / as a minnow untangling itself from

corrupting currents. Restore innocence and

oxygen. The flower was paper, then clay,

then a kiln fire. The sun was shorn off into

 

fractals, everyone wears the sheepskin of

generations and bravery. I’m not interested

in the poem where the hero spirals down

into the root of their wants, their hands full

 

of sparks like a divine electrician. I remember

waking up just this morning, sure that it had

rained, every noun a weathered grey with

the yawn of our mattress thinned with gossamer-

 

coloured light. I feel roots everywhere:

tangled with a bow string, with waves of

cherry blossom trees. Every generation had

 

a craft. They worked with porcelain, food,

and silence. Now my mother’s kimono is

used as a curtain, but when I call you to ask

about history, I’m pulling it away, I’m

asking for the sun to pour through, because

I’m ready to wake up.