WHAT THE BAHA'I BOY SAID TO THE MIRROR
by Matt Pasca
I want to be less complicated
to molt this costume
I sprint from every night, wake
inside tomorrow
Most days, my tongue is a shiv
stabbing through my cheek
If I were a Tik Tok baker, Bitcoin bro
or three-legged Siamese cat
I’d be more relevant
But I am a fig tree
in a strawberry patch, alpaca
in a pig pen, ice floe
in a breakroom cabinet
My first three therapists found me so interesting they couldn’t help me
My fourth, a Freudian Society octogenarian, never blinked
or seemed to care, so I loved him—
no one likes the King of Uniqueness
(especially the king)
Every country my great-grandparents fled called them Jewish instead
Am I, born Baha’i, any different?
Galadriel invites me to her elven pool & says
To be raised as you have, in America, in your body, is to be alone
A toast, then—
to pythons dreaming of feet
cacti staring at the rain
& every tired wheel
hungry for a cliff
Matt Pasca is the author of two full-length poetry collections—“A Thousand Doors” (2011 Pushcart nominee) and “Raven Wire” (2017 Eric Hoffer Book Award Finalist)—and work that has appeared in more than 50 publications. A 2003 New York State Teacher of Excellence, Pasca has taught Creative Writing, Mythology and Literature to high school seniors since 1997 and college students at Adelphi University since 2024. Matt co-hosts a monthly poetry series, Friday Night Fire, with his wife and fellow author Terri Muuss, and was named Long Island Poet of the Year by the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association in 2022. www.mattpasca.com @mrpasca