Burning Away

Burning Away

You can imagine most things
in my household as alien
to this country,
I do too.

Which possibly means:
my heritage is all bones.

Language, folklore,
the fermented fish developing
in a plastic womb, holocaust tales,

never properly fed—it rots slowly.

there is no substance anymore…

I imagine watching culture die
must be like watching your mother’s
house burn down,

the needless furniture,
her kitchen, your heirlooms,
all of it gone.

Can you imagine what it’s
like for a mother to stand guard
as her life amounts to just
furnace and frames?

How long it must have seem
for her before it collapsed.

It is so unbearable that you
begin to pray she was still
in there!

Everyday is like this,
and it is just awful.