May 28, 2026

Poems from Emily Ahmed’s On Distance

by Emily Ahmed

On Distance by Emily Ahmed is a collection of poetry that explores familial fictions and reality; myth and collective memory. Each poem can be read as a line that either moves toward or away from a pulsing, blurry core: the concept of home. The lines are sometimes short and tender, other times long and searching, but the reader’s attention is always directed toward the distance needed to reach the core.

—Layla Faraj, NNAAC Fellow

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Don’t we all move and imagine

if we stopped someplace, we never would?

—Emily Ahmed

The Cottage

I’d drop my last life gliding
through my fingers like sand, wash up
on this new shore tired again
of being stuck, old waters clinging
like tea on a biscuit, but I know the sun

here could forgive, dry my dress.

Locals say the plankton will glow
at your toes, rooms are grief
with seashell decor, the smell of nature
harsh as life itself, swamps craggy
on one bank, waves debating on the other.

Here, I could awaken in gentle
white frills when day trips over
the moon spilling its cocktail,
be the linen caressing soft one,
not the mess for once, forgetting

I dreamed in denim and concrete.

After spring flowers, I could bloom, see
the convenience stores, fast food restaurants
red and yellow mosaic
of Main Street, could drop everything
right now and spy the tentacles

of the Milky Way
Don’t we all move and imagine

if we stopped someplace, we never would?
I’ll muddy my dress, throw on regret,
but you can’t miss something

to return,
you can only miss it to death.

The Local

I love a local,
baseball cap backwards
gesturing Manhattan directions
from the counter of the cafe—
blessed city life. While I grasp at my suitcase,
I love a local,
sit at the apartment with no one to call,
I love a local.
I loved what I loved and that was pretending
with The Local,
because I wished I was like
The Local, together,

we ate dinner down the street at a place everyone called
The Local.

I wanted to be a
hang-up-frames-and-nail-up-those-prints-here-to-stay local,
a hear-my-voice-and-know-which-region-I’m-from local.
I love a local who has family reunions in the DMV,
bless The Local who told me to find a city, any city, just choose girl, choose,
who said, Detroit is always here for you, local.
Best-friends-with-my-cousins-go-on-beach-trips local.
Staring at the rainbow Millenium Bridge saying, I-can’t-pretend-I-understand-what-you’re-going-through local.
So wrapped up in my own head, I forget the map and I’m
no longer local.
Intentions so misplaced, not local.

Little-Italy-Little-Egypt-Little-Jamaica-little-world-little-me-
little-you-all-right-here-not-spread-like-butter.

Tell me the culture we build can never be forgotten.
That these new ribbons that tie us will transform into roots.
That I won’t forget my roots. The sand, dust, and water will coat us for generations,
smooth us over and someday they’ll see our fossils and say,
look, the locals.

Being a Destination

I had a friend with hair that fell
in brown rivulets,
who wore makeup even when
we said we’d go to brunch
rolling out of bed,
in that time in our lives
when we had nowhere else to go because
the coffeeshop was the bedroom was the club
was the church was the tip jar
was the park grass and the sweaters spread on the grass
as makeshift blankets,

back when everything was makeshift,
the people, the friendships, and the city—
roaming in the cobblestone alleyways,
boarding the bus to a city three hours away,
throwing money at mango lassis
and into the cups of every person seated on the bridge
I worried about late at night,
waiting in line for takeout where the servers knew my name,
recognize me from recognizing our shared unbelonging,
hobbling along that cobblestone,
singing baby, baby, baby with a friend on the shopping streets,
curating playlists to scream along to on the walk home,
thinking, I would love to work in a bookstore with a red door
thinking, I will never go back
thinking, this cake is the best I’ve ever had
at brunch with my friend, and getting swept away under the copper
twinkling eyes of statues, kaleidoscope-stained glass buildings,
beer and sky and stars, bouncing onyx and chocolate off each other,
glistening ‘til the day overtook them and cafes set up their signs
for brunch.

Author’s Note

This poem borrows a phrase from “The Huguenot Graveyard at the Heart of the City” by Eavan Boland: “There is flattery in being a destination.”

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