You will only be heard
When the noise
Has died down
And the air so clear
You can hear
The soundless
Soundtrack of bats,
The cutting edge
In a swaying blade of grass,
The memoirs of elephants,
The beat of a moth’s wing
In a distant whirlwind,
The snap of a lizard’s tongue,
And the gossip of
Ants in the kitchen.
Manohar Shetty has published poems in journals around the world, including Shenandoah, Chelsea, New Letters, and Rattapallax.
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AIMEE NEZHUKUMATATHIL
Sometimes when they were young, I felt like / I was underwater and couldn’t make out sounds / or reason or rhyme, only coral clicks and distant / whale songs. A shiver of eel near my ankle. But /
trust me: one day you’ll surface. They start / walking, then running, and then they sit behind / a wheel.
ALAA ALQAISI
We stepped out with our eyes uncovered. / Gaza kept looking through them— / green tanks asleep on roofs, a stubborn gull, / water heavy with scales at dawn. // Nothing in us chose the hinges to slacken. / The latch turned without our hands. / Papers practiced the border’s breath.
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