Ahimsa Timoteo Bodhrán is the author of Antes y después del Bronx: Lenapehoking (New American Press) and the editor of an international queer Indigenous issue of Yellow Medicine Review: A Journal of Indigenous Literature, Art, and Thought. His poetry and nonfiction appear in a hundred fifty publications in Africa, the Américas, Asia, Australia, Europe, and the Pacific, including Revival and The SHOp in Éire/Ireland.
Six poems by Ahimsa Timoteo Bodhrán
ocean
Pressed up and against, hidden between,
tall dried dune grasses, my fingers
locked in the curls of your hair, sand
making memory in the pockets of our jeans,
you tell me my lips remind you of soft
pillows, I tell you, you can rest there anytime.
Kanienke
a place between desire and metal, smithing here, silver, the weaving of baskets before fire, birds beaks cawing, knowing our hunger, woven round, raon-raon seeking red, finest of string, deepening into purple, inner white, row upon row of beads, we gather here, paddle down to water, coast the rest of the way in. here, the quiet of water, us, a drifting boat, reaching towards shore.
flame
the heat present in stone, stones returning to their origin, the bright red heart of fire, yellow dancers arcing up, rising with the air, jazz hands, dancing coals, amber embers, what is trapped there, bluish tinge to flame, the way burning curls everything, incandescent skins—we are lit from within. when you build fire, you make a commitment. what i built with you, smoldering in the ashes. heart of geodes, orange crystals roasting, deep inside the fire. the way light shines through your hair, curls of wood, lit by fire, smoldering. still, my desire for you, eight years later.
waterssong
Dipping inside the boat, I push/pull water to, away, from me, towards shore; the channel changes, current, boat pushed right/left, up/down, forward and back. The boat is moved—forward. You move forward. Moving in something moving, you are. More than air, earth, you feel in water the motion, know its, your liquidity, how things are not solid. More aware of the elements, you are, on, in water, than on land. This wet orb hurtling through space, spinning, thousands-thousands of miles an hour, yet, everything-everything seems still. You are not still in water, water still moving in, on, all around you. Rocked back and forth, you bob, float; move against the motion, with the motion; inside it, you. Glide. You cross the other side crosses you. You cross over. You arrive; are the arrival. The land arrives, greets, as do the waters, part—there are different waters, waters in the waters, weaving, cleaving. How one water envelopes another, one body another. You know this now. There are waters weaving, cleaving—inside you—singing in your body.
The water laps gently against the shore.
This is how I want you to love me.
honey and vinegar/my first butch
momma, you were the first butch i ever loved. many have come and gone since, but none can compare to your power, your strength, your ability to command a room, walk within it, and own it. you were always at the center of my thinking, the white elephant of my consciousness. it is around you i orbited, a satellite to your sun.
i am the woman you never could be. look at this hair, these nails, this skin, these teeth. this is what money can buy. this is what money did buy. your money. your life. i attract men like honey to your vinegar. i am the one stung by bees, not you. but it is not their mark i bear, but yours.
i remember the nights i spent at your feet, clippers in hand, emery board, bottle of jergens, rubbing the life back into your toes, the fallen arches, the horny heels. it has always been this way with me: me at the feet of women, catching the crumbs that fall to the floor, lifting them up to my mouth, giving thanks and praise, while other boychildren ran about me; the girls, they too had their way. hairs unbraided, drifted down, side to side motion, swaying, me, listening for clues.
from down below i could see your legs, varicose-veined, ridges and craters, rivers bulging their banks, traversing your terrain, thin-legged spiders crawling up towards your crotch. is that where their nest lies, between your legs? where their nest lies, where the rest, your nest, lies. where i come from is like that. the wart on your finger, rubbing your rings, the golden wedding band, rubbed raw. rings, rings, ringlets, how i hated your hair, the smell of chemicals, the beauty shops we went to; how i hated your hairdressers, permanents that never lasted being your only ever-variable constant. how i wanted more than anything for you to be beautiful: femme. small. soft. quiet. but, no, you remained big and butch, butch and hard, as hard as your heels and as ugly, as loud as anything and as ferocious. you were the one i always ran from, the one i always ran to, the one whose love and approval i needed most, and sometimes got.
you are not the kind found in card stores, no high-priced hallmarks hold your image, no sitcom icons bear your name. once i feared losing you, lost in a place without time or recorded history. now i fear neither death nor assimilation.
momma, i now know all that i ever needed to know: i know that when you die, i will become you.
Post
This is sobering. The years I woke up in different cities, no memory of means of transport, others carrying me into bed. The time I drank three liters of wine in one night, and was fine, stumbling on beaches outside Venice at 17, waking up buzzed, still having eyebrows, drinking more at lunch, later, in what is to become post-Czechoslovakia. Oktoberfest in Mai, post-Mauer. It’s amazing what a scholarship can do. The time I kicked a Black girl in the stomach when they tried to take me home, out of the frat house, the fights I got into, bruises I left, punches I threw (away). The boy I stalked and would not leave alone. Also 17. How she never answered my letters. How the school I was visiting put me on wait list, later accepted me (but not financially). How crazy and near the edge I was that year. Señor senior of la escuela. I’m amazed I’ve graduated from anyplace. Jamesway Higher School of Learning. The closet will do that to you. Class closet. Race closet. The white couple I told I needed to be in abusive relationships with because I felt worthless after being raped. Of course, I never used those words: rape. abuse. worth. Amazing how any language fits inside our mouths. How they all said he was such a nice guy. Look at the flowers he b(r)ought you. “I need pain so that I’ll recognize pleasure.” My father worked hard. I never saw him. What we use for education; entry level 101/701 course. Remedial, -mediation. c(c). Do not collect 200 (milliliters). What we send on to others. Go back to go. Lose all property, hotels, friends. Open this gift. It is mine(d). The brown boy on crystal I wasted a year and a half with. The way I tried to walk out of third story windows. How I do not remember a good portion of my youth. Brownouts. Fellowship. Shrapneled skin. Falling off a bike. Other means of income. The hatred I have for alcoholics, anyone with slurred speech, missed step, teeth on concrete, stumbling. The way I refuse people the dollar. Why we all need dentists. Their empty cup. The way I flushed my mother’s cigarettes down the garbage, threw them in the toilet. Bailey’s und Rotwein and Eierlikör were my favorites. How superior I felt each time I saw someone else vomit or have hangover, fall flat-face into the ground. Fuckin drunks. I made it without programs, the. The way each of my brothers has become my father, and some man (n)one of us have met. Needing burial, dirt. I wonder how many different drug combinations between us. My education: “Here is someone who drank and drived/drove.” Scalp in a windshield. Body flung far. Polaroid Kodak moment. An aunt in jail. Just say no. “Use your seatbelt. Wear it.” Making fun of neighbors who go to AA and Alateen meetings. Us shooting the dog. My mother offering the father a beer, despite the wife’s protests. He was a good man. How good was he? Brother MP-ed into detox. Buckling up.
We never fucked. But I still hear your voice in my ear as if you were pulling out of me and reminding me to breathe, our back-chest, swamp. I know at this meeting, someone is supposed to make the coffee, but I never learned how. Drainage. Filtration.
The way I drank it as a child—Strawberry Quik.
Which substance, instant instance?
What it means to do without you.
This tree steals water from the other ones. It doesn’t belong here. It is very thirsty. But koalas like it. See how they teleport on TV?
Why we took a photo before it. Some way of remembering. Mangrove. A/TSI solidarity.
Is there some other way to do service? Stay sober?
We think we’ll make it around the lake in time.
My letters keep on getting returned. You never sent me your new address.
The sun is setting. Someone is waiting.
Drink.
The Galway Review 