a collection of fantastic spatial nightmares
don’t measure my story in years, in colors or tears.
i ask what the broken mirror of my words reflect
& there is only why. in this collection of fantastic
special nightmares, measure the strength of my
sound in dust. collect my music in chiyogami
boxes without lids so they can breathe, so they
can eventually float free. remember them in
the dimension that lies between dream and waking,
before the velvet of night dissolves into fuzz &
gets stuck in your throat. how else can i clasp
the creases of my craft closer to my soul
without cutting into threads & flesh & breath.
if the ordinary limits me, let the extraordinary
release me from page & ink. from story.
from the value of fragility found in silence
& the blush of petals against sky. & within
the release i find it. the brilliant. the just. me.
Self-Portrait as a Haunted House
/ when was the last
time anyone washed
the bedsheet & who
gets to see the corpse
beneath its egyptian
cotton thread suff-
ocation what
do you mean you
can’t ascertain
the attic’s location
the bulb still works
the spiders think
it’s too clean to
weave anything
not made of lav-
ender soap &
kissed softly with
wildflower honey /
/ not cracked or black
or even ghost gray but
still spooky so everyone
screams banshees when the
foundations start groaning
again & the scent of anti-
dandruff shampoo inhales
itself into the livings’
pink wet mouths like
september into re /
/ member one is a snake
& member two is a snake
& member three is a snake
& oh gosh all the members
are snakes in blue going
through ecdysis in the
barred piano room /
/ no jeans only t-shirt
dresses & long socks
& somewhere a gilded
chest full of hairbows
of every color though
the wood is brown &
borrowed & broken /
/ too many pictures act-
ually gigantic postcards
blue tacked to the walls
commanding pastels to
dance in the ballroom
lacking a chandelier so
instead there’s a sliver
of mirror a shard of sun
sky forgot to pack up /
/ something vividly pink
stands in the corner like
a headless mannequin
not smooth headless because
it came that way head-
less because some angry
entity decided to placate
itself by separating foam
from form & neckline from
jaw tossed in the tumble-
weed garden now let’s
talk about that monstrosity /
/ statues rock bone plastic
concede to earth & even
the moss is cracked dust
& their ghosts play bridge
on the zen bridge whispering
good vibes only please /
/ you can come in no
one cares about knocking
anymore so just knock the
door in because some kid
from marching band stole
the doorknob as a dare
come in come in come in /
Nine of Wands
I will not consider the octopus
in all its bulging ball sack blobbyness.
I will not consider the sky,
in all her sunlight-melted moodiness.
I will not consider the hospital bed
in which my grandfather expired.
I will not consider the white rose,
thorn-pricked thumb staining satin petals.
I will not consider my over-stuffed shiba inu pillow,
with its pink asterisk-stitched butt.
I will not consider my “professional” e-mail,
full of literary journal rejections and thank-you-for-submitting’s.
I will not consider the jar of honey,
drowning my tea and eyeballs in viscous sweetness.
I will not consider the bird feathers at my patio door,
wings missing a head missing a pair of zygodactyl feet.
I will not consider the time nor date,
4:20 on 4/20 can smoke itself down to the ashes of 4/21.
I will not consider my bankrupt neighbor,
who comes over with a bottle of wine and worldly blame and “would
you buy my house?”
I will not consider sitting still,
for I have not yet looked into Medusa’s lonely visage.
I will not consider the knot in my hair,
for a pain-free plastic hairbrush is the best dollar-store magic prop.
I will not consider dreams,
for who needs the sleepy wonders of fantasy?
I will not consider stopping,
for my words are action, their livelihoods not ephemeral.
the moon missed being in this one
tiny snail dreams dusk but
mistakes it for lettuce so he
munches into an ombre indigo
sky, waves his eyestalks around
like it’s his last birthday, asks
sibilant stars to sing him some
sunny songs. he opens his mouth
to partake in the celestial karaoke
& emanates suspended cymbal
hsssssoooooooosssssssshhhhhh
during the last chorus. he misses
when he was a blue ballpoint pen
riding in an autistic child’s purple
backpack, getting gnawed nonstop
and tap tap tapped against scarred
wooden desks until lunchtime. the
next time he dreams sunset, he asks
the suns’ rays to transform him into
a ripe cucumber, because the last
one was summer crisp and delicious.
Photography Credit: Jason Rice
Hikari Leilani Miya is a Japanese Filipina American, 2019 Cornell University English major graduate, and a current poetry MFA candidate at the University of San Francisco who identifies with the LGBTQ community. She is the assistant poetry editor for USFCA’s literary magazine, Invisible City (formerly Switchback). She has poems forthcoming in Jet Fuel Magazine and Macguffin, one previous poetry publication in Cornell’s Writer’s Bloc, five poems published by Canadian publisher Fleas on the Dog in Issue Seven, and her poetry has appeared in the Johnson Art Museum at Cornell University.
