POSTCARD :: arteries


Abeer Y. Hoque is a Nigerian-born Bangladeshi American writer and photographer. More at olivewitch.com.

artery trees branched

     high in the riverine sky

     veins to lose yourself

     arteries for finding

 

                                         open your hands

                                         close your eyes

 

         the sun shapes

         each bank and break

         precise and spalling

 

here the limbs splinter

there the ripples thin

now it is winter

                                                           

                                                            the river keeps rising

                                                            reaching riving

                                                            it turns gold at the edges

 

                                                 close your hands

                                                 open your eyes

 

what were runnels

reduced and repeating

become a map to the widening world