Asking for a Friend
She would be flying into town later that day to stay with us. There was no A/C, and records were broken that year. Our parents slept on the floor in the living room. We knew she was from some agricultural republic, originally, but that was the extent of it. We would never get around to talking about culture or colonization much. There was one night when she made a point about the power of language to subjugate, something about mosquito and Miskito. One night, we took turns talking into a fan. I met her brother years later. He was a Red Sox fan. He had a hard time with the “g” in Roger “The Rocket” Clemens. Did he know she was the first woman to ever put me in her mouth? In her language, “Oh God” sounded a lot like “Goodbye.” That summer, we ate corn straight from the can.
ξ
Backstory
Echo’s Prologue
The appearance of the body is never
the way we remember it. The phone voice
is not the unpolished voice of the face.
No one did the pointing out, said fragrance,
or helped us understand weights and measures,
or showed us austerity in the rugged countryside.
At least two of our kind are losing themselves
in the woods: one broken by the sound
of her own cause, a missed call every hour
on the hour, the other gradually gone,
a song across a blazing meadow:
Every goodbye is a betrayal.
Every betrayal a flower.
§
Narcissus to Echo
There are universals that hold even
after translation. For example: one
half of an ass in each hand. A man
comes into full being before you,
a single god drawn out in silence. Would you
pull him in? Would you have something
to trade for escape if needed?
What would make the difference?
He brings you breakfast tomorrow, regardless,
curls next to you like a comma, unfurls.
Every time you climb into bed, you will
remember him. Even in the quick thrill
of another man’s love. We are all myth.
This is beauty. I am who you sleep with.
§
Narcissus Recounts Events from Childhood
I don’t remember my mother and father
ever sleeping in the same bed. There
was no ecstatic blackout, no further
talk of tomorrow. He didn’t stroke her
through darkness: instead, what we call
ravage.
The image of my mother ripples
in a savage brook, almost drowned. At eleven,
he told me I was conceived in a shower.
He wasn’t a very good dresser.
§
Narcissus to Echo
Say: There is no easy way to say this, so I’m just going to say it.
Say: coal-black horses.
You smell good—like a nervous deer.
Say: —so there’s no misunderstanding later—
I can’t love you the way I’ve assumed you want.
Look at my body (remember it).
Every muscle should contain you.
Say: —I’m not sure about kids—
Do you know what erasure is?
Say: saga.
Say: god.
Say: servant.
Say: sun.
eternity.
journey.
Say: sickness.
Say: About desire, I will always have the last word.
Say: bliss.
§
Liriope Gives Narcissus The Talk
This is what I have come to understand—
You live in a country where some boys:
1. can’t, don’t, or shouldn’t wear hoodies at night.
2. can’t, don’t, or shouldn’t put their hands in their pockets.
3. can’t, don’t, or shouldn’t make moves.
You are not one of these boys.
You are privileged: all you have to do is treat
your body meticulously, and hers even more so.
Dying is a political act.
ξ
Poem Note: “Backstory” borrows from and reimagines the myth of Echo & Narcissus as I have come to it through Edith Hamilton’s Mythology (Warner Books, 1999) and Ovid’s The Metamorphoses: A Complete New Version translated by Horace Gregory (Penguin Books, 1960).
Issam Zineh is author of the forthcoming poetry collection Unceded Land (Trio House Press, 2022), which was a 2021 Trio Award finalist and editors’ selection, and the chapbook The Moment of Greatest Alienation (Ethel, 2021). His most recent poems appear or are forthcoming in AGNI, Guernica, Pleiades, Tahoma Literary Review, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. Find him at www.issamzineh.com or on Twitter @izineh.