Matryoshka

I’ve come to hold sadness in my hands To walk a thousand miles in the hottest desert. Drink not water. My feet swollen and bruised. Bloody.

I’ve come to see the face of great-grandmother. We have the same dark eyes. We have the same scraped soul. We bear the same name. There is no escaping.

She’s in me. She’s in me.

In my last moments of life, I want to release the sadness. I want to let it drop from my old, wrinkled, Armenian hands into the Euphrates River To hear it drown away with the thousand, thousand lives Some young. Some old. All tortured.

I want a drop of sadness from my hands a crystal challis That will shatter into a million pieces Each one scattered. Pieces of a Nation whole.

She calls for me. Her breath in me. She’s in me. She’s in me.