Sorry we’re late on the publish!

Limericks for Kaethe:

Kaethe, here are a few limericks for you
Somethings are old and some things are new
My limericks are never funny
I’m writing them quick like a bunny
But that doesn’t mean my love isn’t true

Yai sits to watch TV with her sunglasses on
She can clean for so long it’s quite the phenomenon
She eats salty fish
Carefully cleans every dish
She has enough expired beauty products to open a salon

We made the nuns an apple pear crumble
I think Clarissa is tired of the way I mumble
My Thai has improved
So have my sick dance moves
We danced hard at a crazy party in the jungle!

My favorite activity is to go to the school
We make having fun the golden rule
They smile and laugh
As a act out a giraffe
They teach me the wonders of looking like a fool

Turns out Buddhism is what my life needed
Though there are still things that get me quite heated
Like the absence of universal healthcare
And the rat that ate our underwear
When it comes to finding happiness within, I’ve somewhat succeeded

The minute we both rise we recount our dreams
A life without Clarissa Is a house without beams
I am watching her grow
Like rising bread dough
When together, we’re just a couple of sardines

I miss you Kaethe!

Yours,

Little Alice

The forest only continues to burn in rings of flames, consumed by butterflies of smokey wings, with bodies holding both light and death. What heavy creatures can move so fast with the wind and be released into the sky upon wish? The purr and cracking of bones cry out and echo against the walls of the valley. The small men of fire lick the bodies of the trees with their charring tongue and leave heat bruises for only the rain to heal.

I am so grateful for the body I walk in on this world, for the feeling of wind and the feeling of ground. I am grateful for the heavy blue mountains that rise in varying shades of a black eye on pale skin at night and rest in humble hunches during the day. Their colors muted by the smoke at dusk. They are a family. To each their own story and together a history told only to the birds that fly between their beings. Known only to the stars as they illuminate their faces in their vibrancy. I stand before them in honor, looking up to them and their wisdom, greater than any human known to me, than any creature as old as water. The blond hair on my body takes sense of them and bristles, the house of my being trembles under their gaze. The stilts that support me are at service to them, if only they knew. The sun has already set and the light draining slowly, blues that melt like warm honey into oranges and then a milky red that stands contrast to the deep ocean of air resting on their backs. Spines mimicked by dry trees of splintering decades. Each color holds their own, stands their ground and yet surrenders to the limitless horizon. If only they could feel the respect I held for them, my blue eyes longing to join them, to fly free of my skull. And yet they do know, because they have given me this gift of vision by dipping me by my toe into their realm long ago. If only in a dream. If only in a space in my mind unconscious to me, to anyone. The gecko in the bathroom knows and he rolls a blue glass marble to me across the white porcelain tile. I hold still and watch, watch him disappear with a whisper heard only by him. A whisper sent down from the mountains.

This day starts off the same as every other day here. Except that today I drink black tea with curdled coconut milk. “It’s not curdled” I tell Alice sitting across from me, “just separated.” Alice drinks the same tea but in a pink mug and without the pale blanket of milk. Her back arches away from the wooden bench behind her as she brings her mouth down to her cup, letting her arms lie long and rested on the table in the new light of day. The steam wisps up into the air like white hair let loose in clear water. Sometimes I think someone is slowly smoking a cigarette when the sun hits right. But today I imagine it as how my mothers hair will look one day, and how it will match the stream let free in the air when she drinks her coffee in the morning, cream no sugar. On special days or at the farmers market it’s a double shot americano and only when it’s in the heart of summer does se want it iced. On those Saturday’s I go to the coffee shop on the corner after we get out first twenty dollar bill so I can return with change for the day ahead. As we sit the tea leaves expand and swell in the water like kale growing under the sun. I like to watch them as Alice steeps hers long into bitterness and then eats them. But today she fishes them out instead, collecting them like a pile of soggy, raked leaves, onto a small dish. I have the feeling she’ll save them again for tomorrow morning, just as she did in the cabin over the fall and winter. The tea bags built up in the bowl which one of us had spun with our hands, the clay taking shape against our palms. The fired pottery was taken home in a blue tub, cushioned with newspaper, to sit with purpose on the windowsill. The windowsill that stood between the dense wood stove and the winter air worthy of stiffening trees with its kiss. But now the thought of snow feels like the fading imprint of teeth on skin, the pulse of blood mending the frosty bite. Here in the land of dust and fire and black snow.

Today Alice and I played cards and ate soup with fish and noodles and lettuces, with sugar and vinegar and chilies.

Today Alice and I sat on the wooden table outside of Yai’s small apartment and looked down from the third floor onto the courtyard.

The courtyard where motionless plastic sits in the form of exercise machines. Where cement benches and tables are filled with teenage boys and families.

Tables covered with food in white containers and plastic bags.

There is broken music playing loudly as the sky escapes behind a purple curtain. The sun looks differently in the city than it does anywhere else.

A fain breeze can be felt, tickling the hanging laundry that covered the walls in bright colors.

The red at the end of a cigarette, in the ink of my pen, on my bug bites and burnt lips.

The blue in the air, on the surface of the water in my thoughts, in the reflection of my eyes in the dusty mirror.

The world is chaos and we seek out the calm.

<3, Clarissa

About to board a train to Chiang Mai to visit Alice’s dear friend Bua. Talk of corona virus is constant but as of now we’re continuing our plan to travel to Vietnam until mid April.