SUMMER QABAZARD - POEMS

Summer Qabazard is a half Kuwaiti, half British poet. She holds a doctorate in poetry from Illinois State University. She has served as guest editor for Spoon River Poetry Review. Her poetry has appeared in: Bitter Oleander Press, Blue and Yellow Dog, Connotation Press, Cuento Magazine, Danse Macabre, Eskimo Pie, Eunoia Review,  Euphemism, Foliate Oak, Front Porch Review, LitMag, Mad Swirl, Mobius, Red Lightbulbs, Verse Wisconsin, Vox Poetica, The Camel Saloon, and The Legendary.

---

​
                         Escaping the Desert
 
 
I am not
armed
for this
disconnecting
land
 
This place
is nightmare
on my wrists
 
I cut out
the parts
of my brain               
holding
the trauma
 
But it grows
back and
back and back
 
Sad
and    
bruised          
                       
She    
pretends it
never happened
 
It happened
 
In me
there is
the screaming
of it     
           
so loud
meaning leaves
the screaming

 
The Uncertainty of Affection
 
 
We telephone unhappy
 
We speak with affection
 
The moment smells of vanilla
 
I recognize the moment                 
 
We don’t always speak with affection
 
Keeping by mildness         
 
I notice the leaves
 
I know the starlit spreadlings of city in warmwind
 
I lie under a canopy of music
 
I lie under the color of wine held by a glass
 
Ghosts circle rooms
 
The dead city walks through me
 
I’m star-bathed white
 
Broken bodies are sent into distance
 
I honor the uncertainty of affection
 
I see night change above the house
 
The night offers me darkseconds
 
The night is in expectation
 
Words fall from us
 
Shadows replace syllables
 
The sound is a winding ready to leap
 
The speechattempt has a harsh effect
                                                  
A failing of softness
 
I’m broken by the not-speaking
 
I’m broken by the no-answer

 
                    You Got Stuck in My Head
 
 
baby I’m puddles
                                    meat writer
 
a lot of work
            to cut a person in half
 
yesterday came quivering back
 
            music and lights
fall through you       
 
drunk as Christmas
 
come visit me
                        I will be here alone
talking to city ghosts
 
            every skin flap a window
a worm for life                      
           
licked it clean
spit it out onto the grass
 
anger is feeling things with feeling things with feeling
 
almost had the courage
                        to kiss you the other day
 
                        an undisclosed feeling
 
your flesh jerks with animal agony                      
because you’re beautiful  
 
beautiful words
                                    want to suck on them
 
clatter on                    apple
 
darkness
                        secretly human
 
the living and the dead don’t think so
 
your face asking
 
I did not train myself to love
 
I wanted to be beyond feeling
 
it will be just like old times
I’ll tend to your business
 
say something         
                                    open wide

 
                            First Darkness
 
 
My six-year-old body
was safe before
that day
 
The years before
were sweet
 
The years before
were full of love
 
Safe to launch boats
in the blue road
 
Safe to play
in the red trees
 
I was once
a safe and happy girl
 
Then I knew what it was
to be forced to kneel
 
To have pressure on
the back of my head
 
To have a choking
in my throat
 
And a voice saying
 
Don’t
You
Want
To
Be
A
Good
Girl

 
                                        Seashell
 
 
One of the pink
tear-sized seashells
I picked for you
escaped
 
I carry it
with me now
 
How you
pass
through me
 
Our hands in air,
always just
missing
 
Always just
 
almost
 
I watch the Arabian Gulf
holding my hollow seashell
in my palm
 
Wondering
what kind of love
I’ve earned