Mariah Rigg: Deconstructed

Photo: Joanna C. Valente

Deconstructed

Pink pua fall to the ground, deconstructed,

splayed open on the mondo grass. 

A little bird with a chest like a cowry hops 

across the moss: freckled, legs long

under the ball of its body. Lizzie would like this, 

you say, as mossy tendrils wrap around the dark, 

wet bark of guava trees just rained upon. 

I remember how you felt beneath me last night. 

Above the koi pond, we stand, watching

the ironwood’s reflection swim. I slip 

on the pitted skin of rock and the bruise blooms

into the shape and shade of a red hibiscus, 

frilled at the edges. Pale, naked

roots braid the path down to the waterfall. 

Later, a piece of seaweed chokes me

and I drop the bowl of miso from my hands.

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Mariah Rigg is a writer from Honolulu, Hawaii. She has fiction published in Hawaii Pacific Review, flash fiction longlisted for the Writer’s HQ Quarterly Prize, and has been nominated for the 2020 PEN/Robert J Dau Emerging Writers Award. She holds a BA from Claremont Mckenna College and is currently pursuing an MFA from the University of Oregon.