Zelikha Zohra Shoja
I SPENT SHAB-E YALDA WITH THREE SMALL MICE
IN THE END / WE ALL CRAVE WALNUTS / AND / TWIRLING
I WALKED THE CEMETERY TRAIL
THE SNOW HAS MELTED
TEARING WORDS ON STONE DOWNWARDS
A MIDDLE GROUND IS UNBEARABLE;
S. EATS HIS ANAR WITHOUT OFFERING ME ANY
HARSH SUNS KEEPS US TOGETHER
I READ SOMEWHERE THAT REMINDS ME:
PROTECT
THE LIGHT
ONCE AND FOR ALL // ---
We caught a mouse last night. In a trap shaped like a long green house, a tiny mouse freezes and plays dead at the sight of S.’s fingers. I wake up to S. excitedly waving the trap over my head at 6 a.m. Throughout the day, I’d hear S. talking in a high-pitched voice. He feeds the mouse bread and asks what we should call it.
At the end of the hour, we let him go. Soon after, another mouse appears where the other once was. We let this one go much quicker and as I open the trap door, I watch him run back under the house. He burrows his way back and for the third time, a mouse appears in the trap. S. whispers to him that he doesn’t belong in there. Maybe he’s lost his way and confuses it for a home. But it’s green and protects him even for a moment. Maybe he can feel the bodies before him. A familiarity that there’s a past to guide him back to this same exact spot.
We let him go for the last time. At the end of the night, three mice (or one) came to us in a wave of homebound grief.