"Collude" by Bhanu Kapil

[View this email on a browser]( [Forward to a friend]( [facebook-icon]( [tumblr-icon]( [twitter-icon]( June 17, 2019 [Collude]( [Bhanu Kapil]( with the anemone zero. Drink 12 oz. of coffee in Longmont. Are you parched? Is your name Pinky? What color is the skin of your inner arm, creamy? Valentine City rebate: a box of chocolates from Safeway. Yours, yours, yours. In its entirety. Don’t collude with your inability to give or receive love. Collude, instead, with the lining of the universe. Descent, rotation, silk water, brief periods of intense sunlight striated with rose pink glitter. The glitter can only get us. So far. Here we are at the part with the asphalt, airstream Tupperware, veins, some nice light stretching. Call me. This is a poem for a beloved. Who never arrived. [Like this on Facebook]( [Share via Twitter]( Copyright © 2019 Bhanu Kapil. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on June 17, 2019, by the Academy of American Poets. [Kapil reads "Collude."]( About This Poem “I wrote fragments of this poem into my blog The Vortex of Formidable Sparkles on a freezing cold day after I’d taught nine and half hours straight. It came out of the strange, deep loneliness I sometimes feel in the U.S., and the desire to start living a life in which I no longer colluded with modes of despair and regret. I came to this country to write something I could not write in another place. Perhaps it’s time to begin. Also, the last line is a rewriting or re-imagining of a Mira Bai bhajan, a lament that my mother sang to me often when I was a young child.” —Bhanu Kapil [Bhanu Kapil]( Bhanu Kapil’s most recent book is Threads (Clinic Publishing, 2018), co-written with [Sandeep Parmar]( and Nisha Ramayya. She is an associate professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Naropa University and teaches creative writing at Goddard College’s low-residency MFA. She lives in Loveland, Colorado. [more-at-poets]( [Threads]( Poetry by Kapil [Threads]( (Clinic Publishing, 2018) "Step Two: Higher Power" by Hala Alyan [read-more]( from "Surge" by Etel Adnan [read-more]( "Drone" by Kazim Ali [read-more]( June Guest Editor: Samiya Bashir Thanks to [Samiya Bashir](, author of Field Theories (Nightboat Books, 2017), who curated Poem-a-Day for this month’s weekdays. Read a [Q&A with Bashir]( about her curatorial approach this month and find out more about our [guest editors for the year.]( [make a one-time donation]( [illustration]( [Small-Blue-RGB-poets.org-Logo]( Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit [Poets.org](. You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click [here](. © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038 From Our Sponsors [Advertisement](