No one
drowns
in their
own
waters.
Fish
don’t.
How
could
you?

Its skin streaked
with rain and soil,
bows beneath
just a few drops
of water
grateful for even
that small sip.
Its stem,
a little bent,
its face
still golden.
And in that
gesture,
I saw the
grace of
needing little
   but receiving fully.

I often break the
dough mid-flap.
it becomes prey
to the oil,
which stares at it
with cat-like eyes.
first, it burns
the part that
is torn and
undefined,
thinned too
much by a
distracted
thought.
And in that
moment,
when
the round
should

have held
its form,
I flinch
at the
supreme
domestic
undoing not
because the
roti broke,
but because
I did again
beneath the
weight
of
something
so simple,
so expected
to be perfect.

Sometimes
out of purpose,
Sometimes
out of love,
Sometimes
out of necessity,
Sometimes
for a reason,
Sometimes
accidentally,
We make
someone happy.
And in those
quiet moments,
we feel
most human.

When I force frozen
meat apart before
it’s had time to thaw
it injures and tears
where the ice clings
too tightly.
  The meat no longer
whole, scatters into
broken bones and
bleeding fragments.
  Your absence undoes
me like this not all at
once, but with a quiet
rip, where we once
held each other too
close to separate
  without breaking.

I was sitting
deliberately
cross-legged
on the carpet,
listening to a
divine lecture,
each word felt
like light
falling in
my heart.
As I gazed
down,
my attention
drifted towards
the movement
around me
so many feet,
each searching
for space in
the crowd.
There’s something
special about feet.
They perform
classical
conditioning
on the pilgrims.
Each step a
response and
stimulus to
the next,
saying “Come.”
In mosques,
temples, and
churches,
people take
small, reverent
steps toward God.
Each foot quietly
follows the
imprint of another,
as if reinforcing
belief,
creating a path
of shared faith.
The ground
becomes sacred
not because
of what’s built
upon it,
but because
of all the feet
that have
stepped on
it with devotion
each one distinct
in size, pace,
weight, and
locomotive
ability, yet
move toward
the same purpose
carrying people
through rituals,
toward altars,
toward prayer.
They become
silent guides.
Perhaps this is
why sacred spaces
are always crowded
not just with bodies,
but with the energy
of countless footsteps,
layered one
over the other.
In divinity,
one foot invites
another,
and by these holy
increments,
faith multiplies.

Altruism
has
become
an old
film reel,
where grief
looked noble
and death
had meaning.
Now people
water
relationships
for their
own springs.