acts of god and other lies
Sreeja Naskar | Poetry, Summer 2025
the headlines say the ocean swallowed the city whole & we watch
from our dry rooms the blue light of the news
washing over our faces no one says drowned
they say displaced they say surge & impact
like the water forgot how to touch without taking
my mother texts me are you watching?
i say no but i’m lying my phone a pulse in my palm
the videos spool out a woman shoulder-deep
wading through a kitchen the fridge floating like a body
the couch too & the news calls it property loss
but the camera doesn’t flinch from the dog dead in the corner
& i think of all the words we’ve made to mean nothing
crisis flood zone act of god
how the sky can be so full of violence
& still be called natural
my grandmother says they’re evacuating the coast again
says the sea is too hungry says maybe
it’s just the way things are now like she’s already learned
how to live with the water licking at her door
the floorboards salt-streaked & swollen
& i want to ask her what it’s like to stay
but instead i say take care instead i say love you
because no one ever taught me how to comfort a drowning
except to call it something else rebuilding
& still the water rises a newsman in a raincoat
gestures to the waist-high tide like the weight of it
can be held in words alone
they talk about damage assessments
like the water wasn’t also a grave
& my phone buzzes again my mother’s voice cracked
over the line she says they showed a woman
knee-deep in the street holding a photograph to her chest
& she says nothing else because what else is there to say
except the water came & it took & it took
& someone will call it a tragedy but not a crime
someone will say rebuilding
& not a warning like the water won’t remember
the way it was welcomed in
______________________________________
Why is this piece your Trace Fossil?
“This piece is my Trace Fossil because it holds a version of me that didn't know what to say but needed to say something. I was sitting with that utter helplessness: watching people lose everything, not knowing how to hold it, just sending "stay safe" texts and hoping they were enough. It doesn't fix anything, but it remembers. And that's why it feels like a fossil of how I witness, and what I still don't know how to name.”
Sreeja Naskar is a young poet whose work has appeared in Poems India, Crowstep Journal, ONE ART, Ink Sweat and Tears, FRiGG, and elsewhere. She believes in the quiet power of language to unearth what lingers beneath silence.
acts of god and other lies
Sreeja Naskar | Poetry, Summer 2025
the headlines say the ocean swallowed the city whole & we watch
from our dry rooms the blue light of the news
washing over our faces no one says drowned
they say displaced they say surge & impact
like the water forgot how to touch without taking
my mother texts me are you watching?
i say no but i’m lying my phone a pulse in my palm
the videos spool out a woman shoulder-deep
wading through a kitchen the fridge floating like a body
the couch too & the news calls it property loss
but the camera doesn’t flinch from the dog dead in the corner
& i think of all the words we’ve made to mean nothing
crisis flood zone act of god
how the sky can be so full of violence
& still be called natural
my grandmother says they’re evacuating the coast again
says the sea is too hungry says maybe
it’s just the way things are now like she’s already learned
how to live with the water licking at her door
the floorboards salt-streaked & swollen
& i want to ask her what it’s like to stay
but instead i say take care instead i say love you
because no one ever taught me how to comfort a drowning
except to call it something else rebuilding
& still the water rises a newsman in a raincoat
gestures to the waist-high tide like the weight of it
can be held in words alone
they talk about damage assessments
like the water wasn’t also a grave
& my phone buzzes again my mother’s voice cracked
over the line she says they showed a woman
knee-deep in the street holding a photograph to her chest
& she says nothing else because what else is there to say
except the water came & it took & it took
& someone will call it a tragedy but not a crime
someone will say rebuilding
& not a warning like the water won’t remember
the way it was welcomed in
______________________________________
Why is this piece your Trace Fossil?
“This piece is my Trace Fossil because it holds a version of me that didn't know what to say but needed to say something. I was sitting with that utter helplessness: watching people lose everything, not knowing how to hold it, just sending "stay safe" texts and hoping they were enough. It doesn't fix anything, but it remembers. And that's why it feels like a fossil of how I witness, and what I still don't know how to name.”
Sreeja Naskar is a young poet whose work has appeared in Poems India, Crowstep Journal, ONE ART, Ink Sweat and Tears, FRiGG, and elsewhere. She believes in the quiet power of language to unearth what lingers beneath silence.
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