
26 SCENES FROM TURNING 26 BY KAROLINA ZAPAL
Budapest 43 degrees sunny blue
shovels scrape concrete winter’s anesthesia
felt in waves
the lights dim in the theater
as usual
a woman is upset
I am in her assigned seat
in this country t / his language h / ER native tongue not mine
“widno” misses its English equivalent
it is light bright
has risen
trending words: god woman art etymology religion wife
C.D Wright uses a winner’s vocabulary
labyrinth cycle invisible lightning
graveyard edge ice fog
in a poetry workshop I was criticized for using “undergrad”
because it alienated my general audience
trending names: Olivia, Emma, Ava, Charlotte, Mia
Noah, Liam, Benjamin, Oliver, William
I think now I will be criticized for naming
my child Oliver or Olivia
my audience doesn’t trend
a l l t h e p e o p l e do not trend together
at a Starbucks on Király utca
cheery entrepreneurs assemble a group of mismatched chairs
from various corners of the store (is Starbucks a store
or restaurant?)
they source 99% of their coffee ethically people must be the 1%
I source 99% of my people ethically coffee is the 1%
I see the word “ficus” but read “focus”
the other who sees “focus” but reads “ficus”
must be able to grow wings see stains
as real colors
when the dishwasher makes a sudden clanging,
noise it alerts me that a glass has outwitted my methods
of security, is making time on stratospheric highways
I blow out a Yankee candle
make / shift wish
earlier I watched tennis balls fall
one-by-one
onto a drum set as he laughed a soft texture
he asks me how to pronounce “hemaztophagy”
I swear on my science degree
I missed class that day
“Do you like girls?” “Occasionally”
throws a lampshade over having to develop
sexually
today’s top tweet:
“I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made” - FDR
my ex has to ask his girlfriend if it’s okay
to collaborate with me on a poem he says it’s his choice to ask
it’s my choice to never step foot in a zoo
but I will someday with my child
watch all the men who could have been his father
ask women who will never be his mother
for permission to meet a little boy who is not their son
I judge you by the enemies I have made
the bathtub has one tile missing
we have to get some heavy bleach he says
I bathe on a stain in the shape of a penis
he starts a conversation then doesn’t text back
I am learning the boring
adult way to hold
back
how can someone live on a balcony
with a marbled child
nailed underneath it
forlorn on Christmas trees discarded
some bundled with improvised rope others ragged
I miss when my parents would come back
early telling me the wind was too harsh
to ski
I wake up singing
in my head: “I watch the crowd flow
and think—I love I love”