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  ALSO BY SOUVANKHAM THAMMAVONGSA

  Small Arguments (2003)

  Found (2007)

  Light (2013)

  Copyright © 2019 by Souvankham Thammavongsa

  McClelland & Stewart and colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House Canada Limited.

  All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher—or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency—is an infringement of the copyright law.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Thammavongsa, Souvankham, 1978-, author Cluster / Souvankham Thammavongsa.

  Poems.

  ISBN 978-0-7710-7098-3 (softcover)

  I. Title.

  PS8589.H3457C58 2019      C811’.6      C2018-903253-7

  Published simultaneously in the United States of America by McClelland & Stewart, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited.

  ISBN 9780771070983

  Ebook ISBN 9780771070990

  Cover design: Kelly Hill

  Cover image: © Miakievy / Getty Images

  McClelland & Stewart, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited, a Penguin Random House Company

  www.penguinrandomhouse.ca

  v5.3.2

  a

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Also by Souvankham Thammavongsa

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Disclaimer Page

  Cluster

  Postcard from the Outskirts

  Mother

  Minute Maid Poster

  Sunrise with Sea Monsters

  Pregnant

  We Always Lived with Mice

  Brokerage Report I

  Brokerage Report II

  Summer

  Winter

  Last Day at the Office

  A Seahorse

  My Mother Gave Me

  Gayatri

  Zevart

  Brokerage Report III

  Brokerage Report IV

  Nine O’Clock

  Whales

  Landing

  Manual for Diving

  Ants

  Brokerage Report V

  Picture of Us

  My Mother’s House

  Nandu

  A Pebble

  O

  There Are No Photographs of Me

  North

  A Spider

  Navy-Blue Cashmere

  Glitter

  Cost

  Art

  A Plastic Bear

  Blowfish

  Christmas

  Twins

  Theory of Writing

  Another Picture of Us

  A Snake

  Mangosteens

  Mister Snuffleupagus

  Notes

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  This title contains long lines of poetry. The line of characters below indicates approximately the longest line in the text:

  But who among us would know our way back, could climb over that mess again?

  To most accurately reproduce the layout of the text on the printed page, you may choose to decrease the size of the text on your viewer and/or change the orientation of your screen until the above line of characters fits on a single line. This may not be possible on all e-reading devices. Viewing this title at a higher than optimal text size or on a screen too small to accommodate the longest lines in the text will alter the reading experience and may cause single lines of some poems to display as multiple lines of text. If this occurs, the turn of the line will be marked with a shallow indent.

  CLUSTER

  The story they told us was wide and lost and ever changing

  And the words it came with were small

  Sprawling and crawling for its end

  The end, if something could be said of it

  Tried to take shadow and shape but closed and collapsed at its centre

  Wound around an end a different coloured string

  There might have been an umbrella, shoe, or even jewellery

  But who among us would know our way back, could climb over that mess again?

  Cut a hole into this page and hold it up to the sky

  Tell us if it is day and the stars that kick in if it is night

  Fluff the clouds if they look flat or trim the moon if it is full

  Tell yourself yesterday was not tomorrow and none of it will ever be today

  POSTCARD FROM THE OUTSKIRTS

  Blueberries knot from the ground

  Blue lustre as cold as steeled shells

  Scattered and dropped throughout

  A method of an organized pattern

  Designed to be noticed from above

  They insist they are natural this way

  Nature is ruthless and very efficient

  It is a prevailing wisdom no doubt

  What joy then to reach in and pluck one

  Your face still intact and recognizable

  This act could conclude the length of life

  The decision is not an individual one

  But we know from what we are told

  There is nothing to see here, folks

  MOTHER

  My mother had given birth a few months ago. I thought it

  was odd, as she just turned sixty recently. I had not seen

  her pregnant. But there it was in the room, all formed. A

  baby boy. I didn’t know what his name was, only that she told

  me I could have him, if I wanted, she didn’t really care. And

  I told her I didn’t want him. And when I did, she picked him

  up, and as she did this, I noticed at the back of his head, a third

  grey eye. It had opened and blinked and then closed. She took

  him to another room down the hall and I followed. Then, she

  stumbled and fell, collapsed. I ran to her, to pick her up. Her whole

  face was gone, peeled back, and her eyes weren’t even there. I

  picked her up like she was my own child and held her. I was sorry

  I wasn’t there sooner. And all this time, I did not think of that child.

  The one with the third grey eye. I only thought of her now,

  who she had been to me then, and if she would be that again.

  MINUTE MAID POSTER

  We used to have this poster on the wall. It was

  an advertisement for Minute Maid. A row of

  orange groves. It went on top of billboards

  and was sealed inside the glass of bus shelters.

  The poster gave my parents a different view

  than the one we had from our window. We

  had only snow and the exhaust pipe from a car

  parked just outside. The poster never tore.

  A kind of paper built for the weather here.

  From far away, the blue in the sky and the green

  on the ground looked uniform. Up close

  they were made of a million little dots. The blue

  was made of blue, but the green was of bits

  of blue and yellow arranged on top of each other.

  The yellow came first and then the blue. It was

  the distant looking that brought them together,

  that filled the space between them. This poster

  was our future looking in on us, but we didn’t see.

  We didn’t see how inside it would be my mother

  picking oranges in that field. Her nails cut short

  but dirt still found its
way there. And her hair

  would feel like straw and half her face would sag from

  a stroke. She says not to think on it too much,

  she can’t taste anything on one side except bitterness.

  SUNRISE WITH SEA MONSTERS

  What had once been many shades of sun

  and cloud and what we had predicted to have

  a chance of is now. The face looking at us is

  an outline floating in with two eyes and

  a mouth. This face could be ours looking back

  from some past we’re going toward or just an

  expression trying to keep us out. Whatever it is

  does not matter. Wanting to live does. If

  it is saying something we can’t stop for it. If it is

  reporting the future and says what’s happened

  sew it shut and anchor it to sink and to stay sunk.

  We were going before anyone could call us gone.

  PREGNANT

  In Lao, it is teu phaa

  It means to hold a split, to hold a splitting, to carry around a split

  Whatever you think you are or was, split

  Not split open and broken away, but the split that is still hinged there, the

  coming-apart that hadn’t caught on to anything to break off

  To have never carried that split, to not know

  What then do you know you have:

  A sanding-down, a knowledge of repair and mechanic, how to keep wood

  to wood

  WE ALWAYS LIVED WITH MICE

  My mother grabbed at them with her bare hands

  Their heads looked the other way when she broke them

  When I removed them from the traps I would stare

  And try to remember each of their refined features

  I checked the genitals, the shape of claws, the shade of fur

  The one I remember the most didn’t die right away

  It had a different shape, heavy in the middle, swollen teats

  I thought of this one and what I did

  All the ants ate poison from the tin in the corner of the bathroom walls

  How the label said they would crawl back to the colony and explode

  BROKERAGE REPORT I

  An announcement is coming this afternoon.

  Something about targeted closings, forecasts,

  assuming of sales, royalty revenues, gross proceeds,

  multiple metrics, range of approximation, land

  holdings, future spending, and commitments.

  Watch how rank can be stronger than peers. More

  details will be provided at the closing of this transaction.

  Defer any major decisions. Resume spending and

  expansion. Deploy capital to improve physical

  integration. Main concerns are related to potential use

  of proceeds. Return to historical capital, ongoing

  internal changes. There is an implied discount.

  Proceeds and recommendation remain unchanged.

  Continue to rank. Repeat. Buy. Press release.

  BROKERAGE REPORT II

  It’s robust. The complex dynamics

  of a particular cycle. Prices can

  move higher. Oil wells naturally

  decline. Drill new wells. Concerns

  have been raised. Released already

  today. Proves to be correct. Robust.

  In the long run. The pace is slower

  than some investors would like.

  Nevertheless a trend is encouraging.

  The rest of the world. It’s robust.

  Notwithstanding concerns. We do not

  recommend aggressive weighting

  at this time. In summary, given

  the difficulty of predicting and time,

  we do remain optimistic. A leader in

  this space. The universe remains

  the same. Robust. It’s robust.

  Trends. The risks could be amplified.

  SUMMER

  Everything

  is dying.

  The assortment

  of flowers

  drooped to

  their hanging.

  The cherry tree

  had no fruit

  this year. The

  walnuts fall

  on our roof

  every two minutes,

  relentless,

  without mercy.

  The bees

  don’t come

  around. Our

  neighbour

  bought an urn

  yesterday.

  His wife

  is off life

  support. The

  funeral has

  been arranged.

  WINTER

  Everything

  is alive

  and in its

  full bloom.

  The daffodils

  hold

  their heads

  high,

  signalling

  their value.

  The snow

  is gone. Bird

  nests

  made visible

  by their

  chirping.

  The sun,

  its horrible

  hot light

  unbearably

  everywhere.

  LAST DAY AT THE OFFICE

  It was the potted plants that were

  the first to go. Someone had been assigned

  the task of watering them, and whoever

  that was didn’t come around to do it,

  and if there had been a replacement

  it wasn’t listed as part of the job.

  Then, it was the pens in the office

  and the envelopes and metal-ringed notepads.

  Someone was put in charge of buying

  the supplies and stocking the drawer.

  There are paperclips and staples at

  least. Next, it was the window. You

  could see across an alleyway to the side

  of a Hilton Hotel. When it rained, the cement

  got darker. And when the desks

  were all moved to the fourth floor, where

  there was no window at all, we were glad

  for a door on a broken hinge. We

  opened the door to keep our spirits up. The

  cheques they gave us didn’t clear.

  A stamp with “Insufficient funds” angled

  across the amount it was made out for.

  Finally, the last day there arrived. It was

  obvious. There was a man sitting in

  the lunchroom, belching. He didn’t bother

  to apologize or excuse himself as if

  all these years made us family now. In the

  washroom stall, the ceiling was about to collapse.

  There was a brown stain there, growing wide.

  A broken pipe, a busted toilet. Someone

  hadn’t seen to it by now. There had been

  a custodian. He wore a grey uniform and smoked

  near the front entrance during his breaks. He

  was there when a woman got run over.

  He took off his jacket and folded it neatly

  under the woman’s head. He kneeled down

  beside her to get her last word. Something

  was said, but what that was between the two

  of them I couldn’t know. We were all removed.

  A SEAHORSE

  moves

  at its own dumb pace,

  dancing

  quietly

  underneath

  the ocean’s current, spinning

  unalarmed

  by what’s happening

  or what’s happened

  By all accounts,

  there is

  no record

  for its rank

  above

  MY MOTHER GAVE ME

  a photo album. There were a handful

  of pictures and I am the same age

  in every one. There i
s one photo of me

  and my father on the day he taught me

  how to ride my bike. We are laughing

  and in the lower left corner is a small

  boy sitting on a park bench watching us.