Poems and Texts

Poem by Farnoosh Fathi

Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care.
Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care.
A light peck cracks the constellation.
They want our secret without becoming like.
They want our secret to undo.
Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care—
a pure harpoon dissolves in outer space.
Bone by bone, we have backed too far
in divulgence to frost with reticence,
nor do we look as happy as the indigenous.
Stars, we trusted you!

Brimming over a secret alone, the end
of its thought must be lost in a hum.
Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care—
The waves explode but cannot kill a snail
whose castle is the quiet
on a nun’s navel.

Farnoosh Fathi

Farnoosh Fathi is the author of Great Guns (Canarium, 2013), editor of Joan Murray: Drafts, Fragments, and Poems (NYRB Poets, 2017) and founder of the Young Artists Language and Devotion Alliance (YALDA). She lives and teaches in New York City, most recently at The Poetry Project, Poets House and Columbia University.