Building

By KANYA KANCHANA

“Raise high the roof beam, carpenters.
Like Ares comes the bridegroom,
taller far than a tall man.”
—Sappho

A brief architectural brief

Give me
a circle, a halo, a circumscription,
a sphere of eleven dimensions,
a list of lists,
a key.

Give me
a thunderstorm poncho,
an endangered turtleshell,
a backpack no heavier than 12 kilos,
a cave.

Give me
a terrace of food,
a garden of songs,
a communal lovebowl,
a lab.

Give me
the bones of mammals,
their tendons and ligaments,
their shrinkwrap of fascia,
a ship.

Give me
a compendium of excruciating minutiae,
a harem of small kitchen appliances,
a nest of mynahglitter,
a web.

Give me
the unfittable fit,
the face of the mask,
the toomuch that I ask—

Give me
or go home.

Kanya Kanchana is a poet from India working on her first collection. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, Anomaly, Asymptote, and elsewhere. Her translations have appeared in Exchanges, Asymptote, Waxwing, Circumference, Aldus, and Muse India. Her flash fiction has appeared in Litro and Paper Darts, and is forthcoming from The Conium Review. Her work was shortlisted for the 2019 DISQUIET Prize and awarded a 2018 baseCollective Residency Scholarship. Kanya is also engaged in practice, teaching, and Sanskrit philological research at the intersection of tantra and yoga and is currently doing her MPhil at the University of Cambridge.