Status Updates From Isako Isako

“The lights flicker on. / What is it we wish for? Vengeance, / forgiveness.”

“Without Isako the body is a foreign land with no way into its secrets. [...] Without Isako there is no way to move through. / I stumble down unfamiliar streets in a haze of forgetting. / Have I been here before?”

“Without Isako I have nothing to say. / I sit before a page voided of language.”

“lacrimal”

“The night comes unmoored. She trims toenails / grown long and painted, pinches cold cheeks, / eases the throat’s gauntlet, snaps her teeth shut / like the lips of a coin purse-and, before leaving, / tapes a spare key to the mouth of the drain.”

“The night comes unmoored. She trims toenails / grown long and painted, pinches cold cheeks, / eases the throat’s gauntlet, snaps her teeth shut / like the lips of a coin purse-and, before leaving, / tapes a spare key to the mouth of the drain.”

“How smooth, like time has erased / the particularity from her face, worked / some strange alchemy to make her less / of herself”

“Isako Isako if I could take your words in my mouth. Press your cheek to mine and watch the skin dissolve.”

“You will be sent for by mail and arrive by ship. Shocking pink is a fine color to wear. To travel in style is the only way. A daughter-in-law is like a servant without wage.”

“I in my underpants nightdress billowing like a parachute / into the rafters I rise and rise / Come back to bed”

“O afterlife O instant breakfast tray / O styrofoam cup of apple juice”

“Sing to me Isako, / over your kari rice, pink rollers in your hair / tell me again.”

“I peers through the folds to see what lies on the other side but has failed to preserve memory thus has no desire to return.”

“Am I a part of this. If this is my body then these are its parts.”

“(here, / imagination does the work / history’s lost)”