Final Words, Graveyard Shift
the java plum trees hang comatose,
wrinkled fruit sweet
on broken concrete roads.
cane tracks of village elders,
lingering breath of gasoline,
a hill in the skyline from a distance.
i arch this lifetime in a haze,
gaze locked on my feet,
sandal-clad, forced misshapen—
like a trick of the smoke,
in which gentle hands massage indents
on my newborn skin.
leisure time pruned in dense smog curtains,
restless nights, fever dreams.
i write letters to myself on notebook paper.
the bark i’ve picked from sparse greens
fleas with the wind, & oceans away,
there are records with my fingerprints on them.
dryer lines, thunder storms, fate.
i grasp at straws like a collage of last words,
& swear there is more here left to see.
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Fatima Shahid
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POETRY
Fatima Shahid is a Pakistan-American writer with work appearing or upcoming in Augment Review, The Paper Crane journal, and others.
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