Perfect Symmetry [poem]

Pieces of us lie scattered through the rhyme
Sifting through the sands of time
Reliving the memories of our prime

Today I practice perfect symmetry
But tomorrow, I don’t know what I will be.
The days fall into months and years,
and the time, it’s flowing freely too.

Truth for truth,
what are you waiting for?
Who are you
and what have you come here for?
The golden eyes of dawn
shoots right through your core.

We want to make sense of this senseless life
creatures of habit, yet no end to the strife
as the needle inches towards the knife

Today I practice perfect symmetry
But tomorrow, I don’t know what I will be.
We all fight for the future of us
What happens tonight, that will be up to me.

Truth for truth,
what are you waiting for?
Day by day,
maybe we’ll go one more.
Do you seek a dream,
or have you found the door?

You find life is unkind and over too soon
As the runoff flows into the ocean proves
Losing to history -- nobody’s immune

I’ll pour you out a cold one
and we can sit to reminisce.
Love, maybe you’ll feel it too
if you wrap yourself around mine,
a simple truth of perfect symmetry.

Love, what are you waiting for?

artcreationist.deviantart.com/art/June-Calendar-671222952

Time [poem]

If you know anything about Time,
you know there’s nothing stopping it
from running out
Though it seems to stretch on forever,
Forever is not too long away
rather it is more a great voluminous
cloud, an expanse, like a balloon
that eventually runs out
of air,
that we depend on, trust in,
believe to the last grain of sand.
They say that Time heals all. They
were wrong — it cannot heal itself.
We are shortsighted,
nothing lasts forever
least of all
Time.

Love story [poem]

Here we are at the top of the proverbial ivory tower of amor. The beautiful facade of sparkling glass jewels, like an ideal — sharp facets, reflecting the blinding sun, the brilliance diverting eyes from the crumbling foundations built up through the decades. The river is shallow, running through the archway, eroding the last bits of sturdy stone. The black is faded near to gray and the white is covered in dust, shabby — grown closer than ever but fading. The snow is whiter than the white. But how does one tell, looking from such a distance. A shadow lurks in the frame of picture perfection. It is there even when not captured on camera. The dull edge of a blade can still cut with intention. Sharp pain can be assuaged by pills while still bleeding out. Paint chips off the fire escape as we stand on the edge, flames obscured, emblazoned by fiery passion.

Come see us in our vainglory. Are we not exactly what you have aspired to be?

teharcohn.deviantart.com/art/Glass-Shards-139683474

Before You Judge [fiction]

The names and people in this story are made up but the story itself is a literary amalgamation of various true stories told by people I have worked with. The legal parts is a basic template of a Motion to Reopen used in actual motions to immigration court, with citations to law and exhibits omitted. I have taken creative licenses in the writing.

The Disappearances [book review]

The Disappearances by Emily Bain Murphy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I received a digital advance reader's copy of this book through Netgalley. This book will be released on July 4, 2017.

In the town of Sterling, its citizens are cursed to lose something ordinary every seven years and nobody can figure out why. First they lose their sense of smell, then their reflections, followed by colors, dreams, the stars in the night sky, and the sound of music. They are called The Disappearances. Nobody who was a residence of Sterling when The Disappearances began could escape its effects, even if they leave, except for one, Aila and Miles Quinn’s mother, Juliet.

Fifteen year old Aila Quinn and her younger brother Miles are sent to live with the Cliftons, the family of their mother’s childhood best friend, in Sterling after their mother dies and their father is drafted to fight in the war. Aila is thrown into a world of mystery and mistrust as the town’s residences harbor a secret suspicion that her mother was the cause. Aila is determined to clear her mother’s name and, with the help of the Cliftons’ teenage son, friends from the Sterling high school, and her mother’s notes in her old copy of the Shakespeare plays, they work to get to the bottom of the curse. Meanwhile, an unknown menace from Aila’s mother’s childhood stalks ever closer, threatening the lives of not only Aila and her brother, but also those she has come to love, and the entire town of Sterling.

For a debut novel, this was an entertaining and engrossing read. Although the story was fairly predictable and a little slow going at times, it was satisfying. It is a good young adult novel full of the typical teenage angst, first loves, sibling fights and misunderstandings, and the struggle to grow up in a world of loss. Interspersed with the magic and mystery of the Disappearances, it is well-written, the characters are easy to like, and you find yourself invested in finding out what happens to them at the end. In all honesty, I was first drawn to the book’s cover, and then the story’s description was so intriguing, I had to read it. It was overall satisfying read.

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[Untitled] [poem]

The ocean swallowed the beach, but that didn’t stop her
from walking into the monsoon waves,
naked,
cane in hand, hair like fire catching in the salt sea-spray storm —
everything had already been
lost,
there was nothing left to lose — her salt tears joined the salt sea.
Remembering a last birthday, before the storms came, before
the smoke and thunder, before the sky reflected the earth’s
darkness —
before, even, the last of the hummingbirds disappeared —
the flickering candles on the cake fighting for air
in the subdued festivities, uncertainty weighing
heavy
on every illuminated face, each breath waiting to be the last.

She closed her eyes against the oncoming rush, closed
them against the storm, wrapped herself in the warmth
of the candle flames, and she made a
wish
for tomorrow, flung out her arms to embrace the sea in
prayer,
instinct and belief intertwined one and the same,
sacrificing wisdom for madness, for the wisdom of
madness
and she opened her mouth wide and swallowed the sea
whole —

One gulp was all it took, engulfed it within herself,
engulfed by the sea that was the storm that was
hope
riding on the sea winds whistling to the heart of the world,
to the downed trees and the drowned lands,
in the spotlight of the moon, she used to say,
a dog is no longer a wolf, she said,
the freedom of the wild that has been taken, you cannot 
reclaim.
And her cane lay at the bottom of the ocean, excess.

You broke it, now you must own it. 

Stella '17 [poem]

Note: This poem was published in Rigorous, an online journal edited and written by people of color, in Volume 1, Issue 2.


These high piles of snow lining the sides of the streets
has me walking on the straight and narrow, 
starting and ending at the crosswalks, 
waiting for the lights, and looking out for cars,
like you’re supposed to;
no more short cuts between parked cars,
no more jaywalking in the middle of the street,
no more detours through driveways and bike lanes...
I'm left with no other choice but to navigate
thin patches of concrete wide enough only for one person,
single-person meandering walkways,
negotiating with other unfortunate pedestrians
for that precious piece of clean sidewalk
through the white snow, packed snow, dirty snow,
navigating treacherously over brown slush
halfway through the crosswalk, only to be stopped
by a dark gray puddle of melted once-snow,
looking like the cold mush of nightmares,
that you need to leap over, run around, climb past
over the packed slick hills, or risk walking through it
(how deep is it, really?).
I always supposed the straight and narrow
to be the road of least resistance, but now that I realize
it is only full of hidden dangers and unexpected troubles,
I think I prefer my way of clever shortcuts and
shrewd calculations, risking known dangers and
making leaps of faith,
for you are not entirely blind when making your own way;
you are guided by life's experiences.

zig zag