She chose fuchsia, hot hues, a shimmering bust. Gotta patti embroidery. It trailed opaque on her pale wheat arm, in his arm. She had avoided the sun for eighteen months. All the guests on their feet: Vadhayiyaan! Kinni sohni jodi! Emerald for her bridesmaids, she was not as I know her today. Then floating. Then blurring. At risk of vaporising. Her eyes were untrained — focus, focus — Let’s stay together for the cake, Tujme rab dikhda hai for the waltz. She chose not to give a speech. She chose to ignore the pandit's plea: Wed yourself first to the tulsi tree. Skeletal and doll-like, spinning fast to catch the light. What no one saw was her sparrow. Her vertigo. Her false self-orientation. Sensory stimuli awry. Swooping about her floor length cage; exclaiming its vastness, imported gold-leaf paint. She was both bird and bird-keeper. It was a beautiful wedding. The matrimony failed. She considers and reconsiders regretting. Her sense of direction improving. Each moon saner. She outgrew tradition. Clings tighter to superstition. Offering generous translations in service of self. Insisting on tulsi in her tea. Maintaining that the stars condemn her to a second love. That her garments were the finest. That pandits speak in tongues.

Kiran Bath is a writer based in New York. She has received fellowships and support from Poets House, the Vermont Studio Center and Brooklyn Poets. Kiran is a Kundiman fellow and a Tin House alumni. Her writing appears in wildness, The Adroit Journal, The Brooklyn Rail and other journals. Her debut collection of poems, INSTRUCTIONS FOR BANNO, is forthcoming with Kelsey Street Press this summer.

Tuan Vu was born in Saigon, Vietnam. As far back as he can remember, he never stopped creating. His favorite mediums are drawing, painting, and photography, which did not prevent him from touching also on design and architecture. Although he has attended several drawing, painting, and photography workshops at the University of Montreal over the years, he remains essentially a self-taught artist. His natural talent is profusely expressed through his work. His work was first seen at an auction he organized in 2010 to help people in Haiti hit by a devastating earthquake. Subsequently, he participated in four group exhibitions: Pluriel au singulier at the Galerie GOT (2016), Beach Life at the Galerie Luz (2019), Montréal en Arts (2021), and at the Institut National Art Contemporain gallery (2022) which his works represented by the gallery. He has also had three solo exhibitions: the photography exhibition Brume at Galerie LUZ (2018). In 2021, the exhibition of paintings, drawings, and photographs Eternal Summer/Endless Summer at the LE LivART Art Center. In 2022, an individual exhibition of paintings: Songes Hédonistes at the Institut National Art Contemporain gallery. He participated in an art fair FOCUS ART FAIR (BOOM) at the Carrousel du Louvre, in Paris (2022).