Three Poems by Sheikha A.

 

Metallic Cyclone

 

The bed sheets have slow melted

into plasmic pandemonium, eyes

syrupy, arteries trimmed, desires

axed; yester night’s breaths hang

by a rope from a mansion’s high

banister, thunder pecks on wood,

rainfall soporific, leaden carts

crush into marmalade, street signs

gnash tempered panes; here I am,

holding tongue in hand, mind split

like fragmented fire, teeth biting

shadows; scabs and stones –

 

© Sheikha A.

---

 

The heel that breaks away from its sole

 

I step out of invisibility, the podium

four steps to liberty, a decided norm

whereby quirks abide, mutes rebuke

in their voiceless throats, the wide hall

echoes off of its own silence, the tables

don’t move, the bird at the window cares

less about its birth right as it pecks away

sun-caked grits from whitewashed sills;

the blinds have me covered with sleek

slats of glistening verticality, my story

horizontal between, the east to west end

of a quiet audience, the seminal nods,

Cinderella’s sandal on the foot for luck,

a clock ticking to a mounted mic,

saliva on the tongue like the cracked

earth of a waterless Nile; satin floor

and pumpkin lights; the mouth that opens

like a door to a ball, the kiss of a frog,

lyrical suspension, the heal that breaks

away from its soul.

 

© Sheikha A.

 

---

 

Pre-Autumn

 

It has rained on brown leaves;

inside the length of their spines

 

glistening like polished marbles

was an intimacy too real

 

to show its face, because the water

fell too sweet and the soil had

prepared no reservoir.

 

The flight of dry winds must end,

their wings must stop being stormless;

 

spells of paper boats set loose

in ponds must wash away;

 

their ink seeming wise; within many

lengths of many things

 

the intimacy is too real to be told.

 

© Sheikha A.