Days of Fig
Mid-spring, the dog pushes a wet nose into my palm.
Drawn memories falter with Hartford,
Connecticut. I don’t recall arriving. Despair
simmers in gold trim wallpaper lining this spare room
at a friend’s house where the dog still pities me.
For months, an illusory path: courtship in America
would sit on heartache’s wide shoulder, spearmint
ChapStick, a tiger’s eye pendant, and lemongrass balm
set in a tin shaped like a strawberry. No more, we were done.
Sweetness floated serendipitously. I watched the pale moth
fling itself into custard on a plate no country would notice.
Someday Little Bear might heal that temper of his,
the runner’s face etched on a tablet made from holy stone.
For a while, I admit missing love but waiting took more.
.
Recitative
It’s been said that tomorrow
carries a rack of good bread
though all night, our bereaved
burn notebooks under a green
wolf eclipse. Another region
goes dark under watch.
We’re up to our elbows
with half-news from home
wiping a knife on a dirty
threadbare rag. Gleaming,
we know the cost of roasted
cashews, rice, warm baguettes,
and coins sewn into a shirt
sleeve. What’s been said
about exile might be true.
Fewer leap at this demanding
softly, “Want me or don’t.”
Resume the trembling bit, then.
Miraculous hunger holds
little near the center except
colors ripe with sacrifice.
Our plot is a people hazed
who would go by brimstone
willingly. Who’s willing
to speak of destiny,
noise without destiny?
Destiny without spectacle,
pomp, or machine? For now,
the whole sky could slide
over itself. Some of us
don’t sing anymore.
Some of us remain underground.
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Sophia Terazawa is the author of three collections, Winter Phoenix (Deep Vellum, 2021), Anon (Deep Vellum, 2023), and the forthcoming Oracular Maladies, a finalist for the 2023 Noemi Press Book Award. She has also published two chapbooks, I AM NOT A WAR (Essay Press, 2016) and Correspondent Medley (Factory Hollow Press, 2019), winner of the 2018 Tomaž Šalamun Prize. Tetra Nova (Deep Vellum, 2025) is her first novel.
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Stone Poetry Quarterly 