Issue 123

My sister asks me if narwhals are real.

ON A SUMMER AFTERNOON, Irmak, Mahmut, and I—three secular Muslim Turks—took refuge in the cool, cavernous Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in Morningside Heights. Our interest in the Gothic-Romanesque revival church architectural, mostly, we ambled through soaring galleries, admiring arches that shouldered the weight of the building and stained glass of biblical scenes that…

If I drape its cage to quiet it
in the night, to keep it warm.

When I introduce myself, they generally reply with a greeting and their names, not that any of us think we will remember the names. But our politeness turns us from strangers into temporary acquaintances.

Candles burn low, thoughts grow clear.

The air smells like rubber and rain.

Before a storm, the sky is the same gray
density of old pages pressed together,

Paper maracas twist on strings

In December of 2022, adrift (again) and staying with my parents, I found among my grandmother’s papers a sealed envelope addressed to me.