Papa Won’t Leave You, Henry.

Beautiful men inadequately loved
like to crawl inside vaginas
as if to seep back into the womb
to be what they were before being born
but no embrace with a woman or even
man can undo birth   You Are   I Am 
and even if we try we can’t be Human 
without Being   but I’ve never met
a beautiful man who thought this deep
about such things   I feel so alone
being Beautiful Smart and Devastated

Poem by Sameen Shakya

Image by Adam Strong

Sameen Shakya’s writings have been published in Alternate Route, Cosmic Daffodil, Hearth and Coffin, Roi Faineant and Thin Veil Press, to name a few. Born and raised in Kathmandu, Nepal, he moved to the USA in 2015 to pursue writing. He earned an Undergraduate Degree in Creative Writing from St Cloud State University and traveled the country for a couple of years to gain a more informal education. He returned to Kathmandu in 2022 and is currently based there.