With Great Fear, We Inhabit Our Respective Mountains
I’m talking to the dead in the dawn air
in the time it takes to eat seven grapes.
I’m learning how to distinguish poplar from holly
by closing my eyes and listening.
Sai-no-kawara is the place where a river splits life
from afterlife, where dusklight throws its shadows.
This is where I live now, brushing your hair
away from your eyes as if that will help me see better.
Is there a word for repeatedly going outside
to see if anyone is coming? Is there a word for wanting
to be a mother while not wanting to be a mother?
Sycamores are growing on the moon again
meaning anything is possible, including our continuing
to serve life on this planet even if we don’t
have a child. In all of the ways to come out of this
I choose this one: with you holding a flame in a jar
and dancing under little white lights strung like teeth.
Brynn Saito is the author of two chapbooks and three collections of poetry including, most recently, Under a Future Sky (Red Hen Press, 2023). She co-edited with Brandon Shimoda The Gate of Memory: Poems by Descendants of Nikkei Wartime Incarceration (Haymarket Books, 2025). Brynn’s the recipient of the Benjamin Saltman Award and was a finalist for the Northern California Book Award. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, VOGUE, and American Poetry Review. Brynn teaches in the Creative Writing MFA program at Fresno State, located on Yokuts and Mono lands.