KAZIM ALI

Prodigal

The Tornado

The tornado has not yet blown through the window,
scattering spoons, shattering the pitcher,

has not yet thrown the room sideways
through the back-door.

I am left, abandoned at the table
agreeing then to be reborn.

What if I fled, not into the safe underground,
but outside towards the fields?

If I hadn’t prayed for wind would the ocean of air
ever have dropped down toward me and come?

I lost and then found myself four times,
then five times, then six, so perhaps the house will be safe.

Out of the corner of my eye the car suspended
eight feet above the ground, the rain streaming so briefly upwards.

All I want is to love forever, for the door to open,
the family to return, for the meal to be served,

but as the cups and knives rise in a garland
around my head, the weeping house agrees to fall down.

My Cold Childhood

Far away in the north country, my father the planet-maker
Marks up Styrofoam globes with the surface features of Saturn and Mars

Fastening these to spin eternal from the ceiling of my room
Orbiting the bright light often since by 5:30 it’s pitch dark

In the northern lights I switched genders
To play a girl in all our games

Other Indians across the lake dressed in feathers for the crowds
And I the loneliest astronomer wanted only to leave the earth

Swim heavenly into the dark a desperate sky-sailor
Lonely among the whites, a boy and a girl, a wingless wonder

Fox Week

Two foxes linger in the yard for a week.

Only twice in my life when I prayed did I ask to be answered.

The first time, on an overcast night the full moon shone brilliantly through.

The second time, seventeen wild turkeys suddenly appeared, picking their way through the snow, circling the house.

This time I am a fox in the yard who needs no answer.

I remember nothing of how I was wounded so I must be at home.

Toll Bridge

Is the universe the river or the bridge
Is the house in pieces

Am I cables or a road bed
Buckling in the storm

Is the storm itself god

That year unbuckled from everything
I asked what am I doing against god

Nothing
But nonetheless

And though I don’t know what in
I am drowning

Father Figure

One summer he built the deck with his own hands
Writing the math for the angles directly onto the wood

There was a time I drove home across the state
Looking at my hands on the wheel wondering

Would he be alive when I arrived
That abandoned emptiness I have never lived down