Compromise art
Compromise

 
Bat wings cut through the evening sky in prayer. A
teacup by the sink gives you pause. You realize that
while the answer wasn’t metallic in your mouth,
wasn’t announcing itself, that there you are. Later
that same bat’s fuzzy mantle, a curious treat. Just
think of all you learn because you wake up each day.
How much pressure to apply to an avocado, to find
your husband in the middle of the night, how to
hold a gaze. For one year I lived in a country that
had been remembered by Him and it was here that I
tried to learn how to be happy with what I had. At
the park young mothers take their children through a
version of a game. Simon says hop on one leg,
Simon says walk backwards, now run, come back,
never leave the house, buy mangoes the color of
sunset. The landscape, stark and white, requires an
answer. In the souk you can find exotic, colored
birds: their plumes expand and shrink as we pass
by. Some prophets don’t want to be found.

 
Rodda Leage is a writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California, with her husband and three daughters.

 
*Photo courtesy of Chuck Burgess.

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