Emma Jahoda-Brown
East West Highway
One year with two afflictions. The hemispheres of
Guilt and relief. I list the good things each morning.
The cicadas crisp shells cling to the fence.
I have been more than one person.
My heart is surrounded by water.
I have a small anger when he talks to me
From which I can grow
The ore of compassion.
I smash bags of ice on the kitchen tile.
I peel garlic and ask for forgiveness.
For pleasure, unearned.
The wind rattles the shower curtain on its hooks.
At six a.m. he lumbers into another room.
His language is sliced fruit.
When I attempt to speak
The machine says
did you mean representative.
Our conversation is put through a sieve.
The swallows come profusely from the barn.
Asterisks of daylight, graphite
coming loose from the page.
Afterlife
Brush box hedge and granite.
Three rows of black chairs waiting.
The pillowcases had admitted
His form: skin dust, bits of blood.
He had reached the end of it.
We leave before the commitment.
The opposite of sacrifice.
The hydrangeas blush.
After their bloom,
they exist without lineation.
He liked to be alone
In the afternoon.
This deprived me
Of emotion.
Religion is a kind of container.
The clouds turn
The tone of sesame.
His oath was just
As it was
Mild.
The Easement
As far as we knew, they had wanted the tree gone,
before the branches bruised their gutters, damaged
downspouts and elbow bends, bumped
their trim, gathered in the eaves.
Before the boughs brushed our windows,
which woke me which woke you,
made you go outside to check
if we were still alone.
Insignificant is what the neighbor said.
Said the pendulous arms
were a nuisance and caught
detritus shed sticky seeds
clustered on bricks, roofs,
parked cars, anything with surface.
The tree too bare in the morning before sunrise,
pollinators made hum, made instrument,
shook down the arterials, a deluge of
yellow flowers showered me.
What had I meant by clean?
And when these buds are crushed,
my palms smell of pepper.
We were sneezing the whole month of June.
Now the limbs have become hollow
little to no watering
makes hazard of what’s living
a sap leaks and I’ve been told it could
embalm or in time intoxicate,
cure an all-around ache,
make me forget sadness and
who am I to destroy a thing like that?
Wild Fire II
The scent had reached my bones
I heard they would try anything to put it out
a chemical prayer dirt more of the thing itself
I looked around I couldn’t see
the disaster escaped a frame
when a body burns the pelvis
is the final piece
surrounded by ash
in panic and lust
I rush to understand my form
what is capillary
how discerning my skin of heat
will I know danger
why windpipe
how many times am I divided
how much is the least
water sleep air any
amount of any thing
what is the smallest amount
of life I need
to survive.
Earthrise
so long any other birth
enter my body onto earth
enter heartache and scenery
a world in parts in pictures of air
of each other splinters in every size
dirt without endings without regret
before taking turns reading from Genesis
they saw where they had come from
a blueness a slit in the sky like the folding
tip of an envelope this is loneliness
to see yourself from the window of a spaceship
no one asking if we’re anywhere yet
About the Author
Emma Jahoda-Brown is a poet and artist born in New York City. She has a BFA in Visual Art from the California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles and is pursuing her MFA in Poetry at Columbia University.