From Tarfia Faizullah’s poem, “The streetlamp above me darkens,” in the current issue:

for this, I am grateful. This elegy
doesn’t want a handful of puffed rice

tossed with mustard oil and chopped chilies,
but wants to understand why a firefly

flickers off then on, wants another throatful
or three of whiskey. This elegy is trying

hard to understand how we all become
corpses, but I’m trying to understand

permanence, because this elegy wants
to be a streetlamp dying as suddenly as a child

who, in death, remains a child….

 

[read more]