Amrica

There are parts of our parents
we will never see

Like countries
that are too far away
or too different
and therefore too dangerous
to consider
to even ask about

My father tries to explain where it is
that he comes from:
“Nothing.”
a shack
a hut
a home
inside a village made of clay and stone
inside a billowing sandscape
a place for peasants
“Iran used to be the greatest empire of the world!” he tells me.

My father tells me
that he got here by working the bazaar by day
and the books by night.
That the stars were better there,
the way they bit through black.
That he dreamed of Amrica
before he could speak American.
“A better life.”

To have a better life then is to
make sure your children never discover those roots or the people who made you, to
make sure they never breathe in the dust that’s collected in your own lungs, to
make sure your children
remain far
from where you began and will never return

To have a better life then is to
be forbidden
from finding your past

[by Sarah E. // published in Calyx, Vol 32:1, November 2020]