"All night, he thought about the sea."*
       

The Little Black Fish recounts the story
we were forbidden to tell. Night keeps us
alert with its rattle of plane trees. Blinds
hush the mouths of buildings. In the garage,
father, leading with a flashlight, gnaws oaths,
while the paddles of our feet lash the footprints
of the moon, whose chador protects the heaven
from us. The distance between words is growing.

They're coming. Inside the uniform of dusk,
we hear beatings. The calls run across rooftops
and sidewalks. From the borders, fixed wings bring
their sterile eggs. The lights litter the streets
as we hide our lives behind a samovar,
ready to stuff ourselves before the fast.

*The title "All night, he thought about the sea." is the last line of "The Little Black Fish," a renowned Iranian children's story that was read as a revolutionary text and suppressed by the Pahlavi government.

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Copyright © 2019 Kaveh Bassiri All rights reserved
from Sou'wester
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission