Arah Ko is a writer from Hawai'i, the author of Brine Orchid (YesYes Books 2025) and the chapbook Animal Logic (Bull City Press 2026). Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of Net, and Best New Poets and has been published in The American Poetry Review, Ninth Letter, The Threepenny Review, The Los Angeles Review, 32 Poems, Waxwing, and elsewhere. Catch her at arahko.com.
ETIOLOGY
In myth, the first
of my people were bears
or foxes or tigers, spoke
to rabbits who beat
rice cakes on the moon.
We talk as if
it happened it is
still happening now.
My father’s childhood
dog ate rat poison
and died some days’ walk
from Seoul. His little
sister would not rest
for three nights until
she dug up his body
with bare hands and wept
more because the body
was less than it had been,
was lessening every day
as if loss was not a once
but always. Grandfather walked
his children and the dog
bones to the mountain
for reburial. For years
after, my aunt searched
but never found the grave.
Once, that hillside
had a name, now long
lost. My father refused
to bury his name in the new
country, watched strangers
stumble over syllables as if
fumbling in the dark
up a mountain. There is
an usness to loss. Every
animal knows its name.
DREAM SEQUENCE
Tomato Dream
blushed red garden cherry beefsteak heirloom late summer early autumn light-fingered branches hot
mosquitoes fireflies fingers dusty with pollen harvest squash ripe peas lush dust-smelling fruit savory
lust between my palms rich as sin cicadas singing push love apple against my mouth powder soft
turned to mold against my teeth black rot screaming insects choking bitterness that lingers waking on
my tongue
Dream Language With No Tongue
Knowing it was a dream mattered little. What was the worst part, I wonder? There was no light.
Nothing to rush the urgent palpitations of my heart. My pulse, bright in my temples. I opened my
mouth to speak and found no words. There was nothing to see, not even the flickers of dust beneath
my eyelids, fireworks of pressure. There was no sound, and no way of making sound. The darkness
was monochromatic with terror. I could feel it building in my lungs. What was the worst part, I
wonder? That there was no color, or that there was one sound? Only the dripping of water. It echoed
in the darkness. The void too empty to be blackness. Too unbroken to be blindness. The water was
ever-dripping. Maybe that was the worst part. I felt my tonguelessness raw and stubby in my mouth.
The taste of blood. Was that the worst part? My pulse, explosions in my wrists. Surely, I would die.
Air in my lungs like glass. The water, dripping. The darkness, its own language. I tried to scream. The
breath left my body, but no sound. My chest concaved. Horror saturated the silence. I knew it was a
dream, and didn’t care.
Dream Of A River With No Life, Planted
Clear water trickled with no fishes, a wet desert. Mother’s careful fingers seeded the sandy shore bed.
Soon: reeds tangled the rapids, slow algae gathered on stones, moss sprouted. Salamanders basked on
deadfall under lichen. Smooth rocks slept blanketed by frog eggs, sulfur-bright flickers of guppy tails.
Life returned to the planted river, which was, of course, not a river.
Volume 16.2, summer 26
Arah Ko
