FEATURING Lara Sarkissian
By Tonia
somebody told me my father went mute after someone broke it to him his father passed suddenly. it was tragedy that took his voice, leaving a timid and scared vessel in it's place.
like when he found himself on one end of an American flag and my mother on the other end, folding it up, meeting in the middle. she asked him about his sister she worked with at the UN. he shrugged, didn't know how to put them in contact. when my mother tells me the story, he sounds like a deer in the headlights.
my mother eventually found his sister and then a marriage was arranged over some tea and catching up. my dad was filled with a healthy amount of wanderlust, which is good considering my mom wanted to marry a poet. i was lucky enough to spend enormous amounts of time with my parents in botanical gardens, museums, galleries, beaches and playgrounds. i watched my father learn how to use a camera and his photos guide my memories back to the sweetest moments of life.
i feel so far from my embroidered flower ruffle bikini and sticky dairy queen trails heading for my elbows (because of my tiny arms, it didn't take long). the farther i am, the closer i am to my biological alarm going off on sight of some cute ass toddler.
my sister was a cute ass toddler and definitely a trouble maker. my dad loved her so much.
i mean he still does.
i mean we all love each other forever. i think my dad forgot he was still loved, because that night i saw him cry once he didn't feel like this world could hold him gently like he needed and he could never voice much with that timid vessel.
i feel his sadness sometimes.
in my dreams where he is a carpenter remodeling a house and he has such a gushing good feeling about it but i know he won't last. it was all those "this old house" and "old yankee workshop" episodes that taught us how to make new out of nothing or very little. it's my papa's story, and in my dreams he's still figuring out a way to make us something comfortable with what he can.
he's still taking art classes and bringing my sister and i along on all his craft adventures. we see it through his eyes- his photos. his words didn't really stick. and i'm only even saying that in the case he talked a lot, but my feeling is that he wasn't much of a talker. he felt- feels- like the perfect amount of everything.
it makes me not want to have children who might feel the weight of all our sadnesses and memories together.
By Hawa
Your hands, mother's hands
they haven't stopped
planting