Only Flying

By Brook Bhagat

Only Flying is a collection of surreal free verse and prose poetry that celebrates transformation and paradox, exploring both the silence of the seeker and the outrageous wilderness of the imagination. Thematic threads like rebellion, enlightenment, risk, courage, love, loss, and triumph dance to life with pictures that swing from dark to light, surreal to whimsical, and strange to familiar. There are intimate goddesses here, black widows, buddhas, alley cats, a kangaroo, and magic pants—blacklight-blue Hendrix flares that hang from a fire escape, just waiting for the right person to jump up and steal them. That person is you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Unsolicited Press
• Release date: Nov 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201802813

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ONLY FLYING

Copyright © 2021 Brook Bhagat

All Rights Reserved.

Published by Unsolicited Press.

Printed in the United States of America.

First Edition.

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. People, places, and notions in these stories are from the author’s imagination; any resemblance is purely coincidental.

Attention schools and businesses: for discounted copies on large orders, please contact the publisher directly.

For information contact:

Unsolicited Press

Portland, Oregon

www.unsolicitedpress.com

[e-mail]

619-354-8005

Cover Design: Kathryn Gerhardt

Editor: Alexandra Lindenmuth

Print ISBN: 978-1-950730-83-4

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

THE MAMMOTH

YOU WERE BORN IN BUTTERFLY

ECLIPSE

I GET FOUND, 1974

THE SAME WOMAN (SCARLIGHT)

JUMP (MAGIC PANTS)

THE SKY OF THE SKY

WAVESTAR BANG

THE RIVER’S HARP

THE LEFT EYE IS ENOUGH

DOWNWELLING

I FOUND A PAIR OF HANDS DIGGING IN THE GARDEN

THE STAR AND THE CROP

THERE IS A MOTHER WAITING FOR YOU, A KANGAROO

POCKET HOLLOW

SHE COMES IN ON A PEAHEN

THE WAY THE WORLD ENDS

SEVEN NOTES

THE GOBLIN KING SLIPS AN EMPTY STRING

THE WATERFALL

THE WEST WING

THE LADY SCARECROW

SOFT FRACTURE

ONCE UPON A TIME I DIED

MARS KISSES CLING HARD

THE FISHERMAN’S GAZE

THE WIDOW’S CAT

THE MASTER

THE EDGE OF THE WOODS

GRANDMA’S EGG

GOOD DREAM BAD DREAM

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: THE MAP

NIGHTSHIRT

CIRCLE, HEART, CROCODILE, RIVER

I’M BUILDING A HOUSE ON THE RAILROAD TRACKS

PUBLIC POEMS BUILT ON PUBLIC PROPERTY

THE GOLDEN THREAD

WOKE UP THIS MORNING

WE ARE APRICOT TREES

ONLY FLYING

With Gratitude

Acknowledgements

About Brook Bhagat

About the Press

for Grandma Muriel

for planting the seed of writing in me

and watering it with love my whole life

THE MAMMOTH

You can’t do it. You are too small, too fat, too thin, too broken. You are not dressed, and your father is not with you. How can you ride the mammoth?

You will twist the auburn fur in your shaking fists. Your heart will quicken and the musk will repel and excite you, make your body know how far you are from home. You will hear the grunts and huffs and see how it shifts its weight; you will imagine losing everything, but you will not turn back this time. You will plant your naked feet in the right places—thigh, third rib, left shoulder. You will remember the magic words and whisper in its ear: Carry me gently, Beast of Earth; carry me gently, Beast of Fire. Carry me gently and I will owe you; carry me gently and I will love you.

You will feel the sweat of the beast penetrate your pores. You will relax the barrier of your skin, open your chest to the monster, expose all your secrets and weaknesses. You will feel the marrow of the mammal mixing with your own and stop insisting on difference. You will let the fences in your mind blaze and admit they were made of paper, always on the verge of burning.

Perhaps you will fail and be killed. Perhaps you will be thrown, trampled, crushed, impaled with tusks through your very center. Perhaps you will soil yourself before you die, and everyone will see.

Perhaps your father will die before you, or your mother, or your beloved, or your child. Perhaps they will leave you some other way. Perhaps it will be your fault.

Yet, remember, the animal may feel your defenseless essence and find you worthy. It may trust your promise, let you ride. The fear may begin to fade, and you may find your balance. You may feel the rhythm of its breath rising and falling with your own, and you may savor the warmth of its body on your underside. You may enjoy the fragrance of flowering trees as you pass and the view from the height of its back. It may become your familiar, and you may ride with closed eyes and send it wordless messages that only it could understand, and it may share its infinity with you. You may lay belly-down on its neck, and it may