ALL BODIES
As in every language,
there are different words
for all bodies
of water. Somehow
it still surprises me
how many. Like the goldfish
who died one after
another in the days leading up
to Nowruz, the New Year
whispering
at their budding
lips. There are rules:
I don’t know them yet.
From what I can tell,
rood-khaneh is House
of River. The Ocean
encompasses
The Seas. You will find
fountains and springs
in any suburban
yard, children’s hands
submerged within them.
And you can become
imprisoned in any
window you see
through. Once
kayaking, my small
boat flips over
in the rapids. I become
like a fish, betrayed
by my own opened
mouth. For fourteen days
I drown in my
great-grandma’s kitchen,
and the sabzeh grows
backwards into
itself. The rings
of my scales sound
outwards. My belly
splitting open
the surface. I pretend-
die like this, watching
the people twirl together
like water-bugs, some heaven
above me. A young boy
wades over to watch
me, from the other side
of the glass, eating
myself to death.
—from Rattle #77, Fall 2022
__________
Darius Atefat-Peckham: “In my poem ‘All Bodies,’ I was interested in exploring the acquisition of knowledge as a way of attempting to know a place—the beauty and pitfalls of this method. Learning about the history, language, and culture of Iran has been one form of transport for me as I yearn to go there physically, but can also feel, at times, like an imprisonment of sorts: of the body, the spirit, the mind. I guess I wonder if there can exist something about connection that is beyond the physical. Can we connect in the breathing, the drowning, the looking? I think we can and many of my most recent poems are attempts to do so.”
