Close your eyes and swallow the host of your lineage in a single mouthful.

Alone
amid marble steps
You shiver in the living room
and assume the irreversible:

“And how, from there, from that edge, that muffled yell, that tumbled childhood, can a kingdom spread?”

it’s not a game. It’s the last time he’ll let us in late.

There are the pigeons, fluttering. End of the minute. Silence. Hundreds of pigeons fly at me, shit on you.

returning to the garden in the evening
shouting ready or not
and waiting twenty years to say
olly olly oxen free

Sipping
swallowing
licking

cup-fraction
where her lips
could
have left behind
a drop.

But they recognize you,
The violin of every song,
You hear golden ovations from the dressing room.

Will you get married?
Yes
When?
Soon
To who?
Me
Who are you?
Papa

“he’s not home”
“do you know where he went?”
“to herd none of his sheep”

Simple: naïve / milkweed / that which only seeks to tend its own garden / look at him all cool as a cucumber, and what have you gotten yourself into, little creature? ​

You longed to be like her, whinnying in the storm, swimming the seas of the continent.

Lullaby: low, slow song for soothing to sleep. Adult: differential position / insomnia. Jasmine: in Sufi aromatherapy, a bond-strengthening essence. Creature: living thing / product: of man’s imagination, generally fantastical in nature.

Everything at once, said Mozart, who one day heard the whole composition in a single line. Those who leave, we’re the eagle flying over the monolith.

“And how, from there, from that edge, that muffled yell, that tumbled childhood, can a kingdom spread?”

returning to the garden in the evening
shouting ready or not
and waiting twenty years to say
olly olly oxen free

Close your eyes and swallow the host of your lineage in a single mouthful.

There are the pigeons, fluttering. End of the minute. Silence. Hundreds of pigeons fly at me, shit on you.

Alone
amid marble steps
You shiver in the living room
and assume the irreversible:

Sipping
swallowing
licking

cup-fraction
where her lips
could
have left behind
a drop.

“he’s not home”
“do you know where he went?”
“to herd none of his sheep”

Simple: naïve / milkweed / that which only seeks to tend its own garden / look at him all cool as a cucumber, and what have you gotten yourself into, little creature? ​

it’s not a game. It’s the last time he’ll let us in late.

But they recognize you,
The violin of every song,
You hear golden ovations from the dressing room.

Will you get married?
Yes
When?
Soon
To who?
Me
Who are you?
Papa

You longed to be like her, whinnying in the storm, swimming the seas of the continent.

Lullaby: low, slow song for soothing to sleep. Adult: differential position / insomnia. Jasmine: in Sufi aromatherapy, a bond-strengthening essence. Creature: living thing / product: of man’s imagination, generally fantastical in nature.

Still have the scar from that bubble on the back of your wrist.

Everything at once, said Mozart, who one day heard the whole composition in a single line. Those who leave, we’re the eagle flying over the monolith.

The show begins. It’s ready. You sit to watch the audience. Now you can clap.

Here when? Between walls of sound. Who now? Not wondering. That, there. Soon. You're not.

CHILDHOOD IS SOMETHING ELSE.

a type of speech

MINUTIAE

from the same arm of the scales
You satiate childhood with fables of fountains

You picked out mother’s dress. It was black.

The lord has given, the Lord has taken away.

“And how, from there, from that edge, that muffled yell, that tumbled childhood, can a kingdom spread?”

returning to the garden in the evening
shouting ready or not
and waiting twenty years to say
olly olly oxen free

Sipping
swallowing
licking

cup-fraction
where her lips
could
have left behind
a drop.

Close your eyes and swallow the host of your lineage in a single mouthful.

There are the pigeons, fluttering. End of the minute. Silence. Hundreds of pigeons fly at me, shit on you.

“he’s not home”
“do you know where he went?”
“to herd none of his sheep”

Simple: naïve / milkweed / that which only seeks to tend its own garden / look at him all cool as a cucumber, and what have you gotten yourself into, little creature? ​

But they recognize you,
The violin of every song,
You hear golden ovations from the dressing room.

Still have the scar from that bubble on the back of your wrist.

The show begins. It’s ready. You sit to watch the audience. Now you can clap.

CHILDHOOD IS SOMETHING ELSE.

a type of speech

MINUTIAE

Alone
amid marble steps
You shiver in the living room
and assume the irreversible:

You longed to be like her, whinnying in the storm, swimming the seas of the continent.

Lullaby: low, slow song for soothing to sleep. Adult: differential position / insomnia. Jasmine: in Sufi aromatherapy, a bond-strengthening essence. Creature: living thing / product: of man’s imagination, generally fantastical in nature.

Everything at once, said Mozart, who one day heard the whole composition in a single line. Those who leave, we’re the eagle flying over the monolith.

The lord has given, the Lord has taken away.

it’s not a game. It’s the last time he’ll let us in late.

Here when? Between walls of sound. Who now? Not wondering. That, there. Soon. You're not.

from the same arm of the scales
You satiate childhood with fables of fountains

You picked out mother’s dress. It was black.

returning to the garden in the evening
shouting ready or not
and waiting twenty years to say
olly olly oxen free

“And how, from there, from that edge, that muffled yell, that tumbled childhood, can a kingdom spread?”

Sipping
swallowing
licking

cup-fraction
where her lips
could
have left behind
a drop.

Close your eyes and swallow the host of your lineage in a single mouthful.

There are the pigeons, fluttering. End of the minute. Silence. Hundreds of pigeons fly at me, shit on you.

But they recognize you,
The violin of every song,
You hear golden ovations from the dressing room.

“he’s not home”
“do you know where he went?”
“to herd none of his sheep”

You longed to be like her, whinnying in the storm, swimming the seas of the continent.

Lullaby: low, slow song for soothing to sleep. Adult: differential position / insomnia. Jasmine: in Sufi aromatherapy, a bond-strengthening essence. Creature: living thing / product: of man’s imagination, generally fantastical in nature.

Alone
amid marble steps
You shiver in the living room
and assume the irreversible:

returning to the garden in the evening
shouting ready or not
and waiting twenty years to say
olly olly oxen free

“And how, from there, from that edge, that muffled yell, that tumbled childhood, can a kingdom spread?”

Sipping
swallowing
licking

cup-fraction
where her lips
could
have left behind
a drop.

Close your eyes and swallow the host of your lineage in a single mouthful.

There are the pigeons, fluttering. End of the minute. Silence. Hundreds of pigeons fly at me, shit on you.

“he’s not home”
“do you know where he went?”
“to herd none of his sheep”

Simple: naïve / milkweed / that which only seeks to tend its own garden / look at him all cool as a cucumber, and what have you gotten yourself into, little creature? ​

Alone
amid marble steps
You shiver in the living room
and assume the irreversible:

Still have the scar from that bubble on the back of your wrist.

it’s not a game. It’s the last time he’ll let us in late.

But they recognize you,
The violin of every song,
You hear golden ovations from the dressing room.

The show begins. It’s ready. You sit to watch the audience. Now you can clap.

“And how, from there, from that edge, that muffled yell, that tumbled childhood, can a kingdom spread?”

Close your eyes and swallow the host of your lineage in a single mouthful.

Alone
amid marble steps
You shiver in the living room
and assume the irreversible:

There are the pigeons, fluttering. End of the minute. Silence. Hundreds of pigeons fly at me, shit on you.

But they recognize you,
The violin of every song,
You hear golden ovations from the dressing room.

returning to the garden in the evening
shouting ready or not
and waiting twenty years to say
olly olly oxen free

Sipping
swallowing
licking

cup-fraction
where her lips
could
have left behind
a drop.

“he’s not home”
“do you know where he went?”
“to herd none of his sheep”

You longed to be like her, whinnying in the storm, swimming the seas of the continent.

Simple: naïve / milkweed / that which only seeks to tend its own garden / look at him all cool as a cucumber, and what have you gotten yourself into, little creature? ​

Still have the scar from that bubble on the back of your wrist.

The show begins. It’s ready. You sit to watch the audience. Now you can clap.

Lullaby: low, slow song for soothing to sleep. Adult: differential position / insomnia. Jasmine: in Sufi aromatherapy, a bond-strengthening essence. Creature: living thing / product: of man’s imagination, generally fantastical in nature.

Sara Camhaji

visualize the voice of thought.
think the image of the voice.
provoke destiny. play.
from chance, from the sigh.
understand the force that links
the image to the name.
the name is an image.
the image is a verb.
play. nothing is chance.
destiny is a game.
everything is destiny.

This site is part of the project "DON´T TAKE PHOTOS OF THE LANDSCAPE; TAKE PORTRAITS WITH THE VIEW OF THE BACKGROUND IF YOU LIKE", whose creative object revolves around the phenomenon of memory and its conceptual visualization. Thus, Sara explores the different languages on which the mind reloads its truth and the way it constructs our inner world.
About
SARA CAMHAJI (Mexico City, 1986) is a writer, teacher, and mother. Her work is a natural response to her lived experience and the emotional dimensions she has inhabited. She has told and written stories for her entire life. Poetry—the axis of her exploration—has prompted her to develop new discursive forms in close contact with inner human reality; wrenching, they open themselves to embodiment and appropriation. She has a master’s in creative writing, two children, and two published works: Maleza (Alboroto Ediciones, 2022) and this one. A selection of her poems appeared in the UNAM’s Periódico de Poesía. She received a grant from Asylum Arts in 2017 and was awarded the Peleh Fund arts residency in Berkeley, California, for 2023. Narrated poetry or poetic narrative? Sara writes in the voice of an archive with a voice of its own, like a thinking time machine, or from the dark sincerity of she-who-didn’t-know-she-had-to-live.
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