Litany of Indestructible Things

By Saba Zahoor

There’s a microbe that eats radiation,

gathering up its shattered self

faster than it is broken;

 

brainless slime molds approximating Tokyo’s rails;

 

and my favorite, the water bears –

the indestructible space walkers.

 

Fossils that looked back at destruction,

like Lot’s wife

and turned to stone;

 

flawless obsidian forged in fire,

sharper than a Japanese katana;

 

and my favorite, the meteorites,

surviving rites of passage

through the atmosphere.

 

Hope in the face of adversity,

that even war will end one day.

 

The innate will to meaning,

persisting through ages;

 

and my favorite – the indestructible belief

that I will one day meet my Creator.

 

Saba Zahoor was born in Srinagar, Kashmir and currently lives in Saudi Arabia. An engineer by profession, her poems have previously appeared or forthcoming in Inverse Journal, Mountain Ink, Fevers of the Mind, The Asahi Haikuist Network, The Muse India Journal and Critical Muslim Magazine.