What the River Keeps
An Unsent Letter
✦
my grandmother’s hands smelled of cardamom
and the rain she let in through the window
because, she said, a house must breathe.
i have tried every soap in Lahore.
my hands only ever smell of hands.
How did it leave you?Your reaction helps Noor Fatima know what landed.
i folded the evening into a paper boatand set it on the water at Shahdara.it did not sink. it did not float away.it turned, once, the way you turnedat the station, as if to say something,and then it did not say it.
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