Family History Rewrite by Jaz Sufi

---

after K. Iver

Start when my grandparents were fifteen.

The first time. They stood at an altar.

Hand-in-. Hand. They lied. Said they were. 

Of age. This time. Their parents don’t drag 

them home. To make them. Wait. They know.

Now. It changes. Every-. Thing.

In this world my mother may not be.

Born. Youngest of seven. My grandmother

made many. Choices she couldn’t. Always.

Live up to. My grandfather the same.

No one stops. Them. Without 

the church. Without their mothers. 

They choose. A smaller. Family. 

Three children or maybe four. Enough 

to feed without. Fear. The daughter/s go. Un-

touched. Or else. Son/s. Love’s reckoning comes.

Gently. My grandmother writes

for. A living. She sings. For herself. My grandfather

sells. News-. Papers. His hands. Always.

Too full. To make. Other choices. No one has ever 

seen Yosemite. Its sheer drop. The clear water.

They vacation somewhere less.

Beautiful. Their children. Three (or maybe 

four) scatter across a campsite. Drawn away.

To tree or river or camp-. Fire. “Oh Bob.”

Says my grandmother. Exasperated but

tender. Her cruelness. Lifted. Like a 

child from its crib. My grandfather holds 

her from behind. They rock. Together 

to the music of the rushing water. 

And their scattered son/s and daughter/s.

In the distance my mother. Watches.

From the body of a doe. Inside her.

Me. From the freckle of a fawn. 

---

Jaz Sufi (she/hers) is a mixed-race Iranian-American poet and arts educator. Her work has been published or is upcoming in the Adroit Journal, AGNI, Black Warrior Review, Muzzle, and elsewhere. She is a National Poetry Slam finalist and has received fellowships from Kundiman, the Watering Hole, and New York University, where she received her MFA. She lives between the Bay Area and Brooklyn with her dog, Apollo.

---

29 April 2024