Safia Elhillo

Modern Sudanese Poetry

my husband works his fingers into the knot muscled against my spine     & my dead stay dead           my hair a knotted cursive language my ligature       my grief  barely literate      my amulets knotted around my neck & wrists     my language my language     cursive & silent         glottal & knotted & scarring the cheeks of my dead      adorning the hair of my dead       tallow in their braided hair i read the books in translation     where is the poem & circle every word i know               acacia     lupin sandalwood & ash      they ululate       my dead they squat like brides          over clay pots of smoke a yolk suspended in each open eye          & some in truth are not dead    my dead     & i am who is lost        who is not counted among the living the poem is not owed me       i was wed in all the colors of my dead        the reddening     the borrowed gold i wrote the poem in translation      i wrote the poem in the loophole     i wrote the poem in cursive i snarled it     i picked apart the threads & wove a shroud i was wed in it     i unfastened      i broke my fast with apricots furred like the ears of my dead      i looked laterally for ancestors      i descended left & right     i read the book in arabic      knew each letter & its sound     & did not recognize the words for tallow     for ululate     my dead my languages      my ligatures      smoke in my loosened hair