Milkweed Editions

We’ll say unbelievable things
to each other in the early morning—

Lesson

For beginning metaphysicists and people of color

Mother named us after birds—
Dove, Starling, Sparrow, Wren—
to keep together. “

We trust.
I try to know better, to know history
from fiction, science from sanctity, yet,
what to believe when one night, alone
at the bus stop, I see the stubs of our faith
skitter about me? How long to pause
before opening the barn door?

a lie I told & here the lie untell.

Once, I held Time, not it me.

In Korea, a girl with a single long braid meant something (unwed).

Home, you imagine,
goes on forgetting you.

I stood and let her rake me as she wanted, with her scour, her gruff. I stood and let her have that much of me.

We like to make ourselves known—the scraps of us, the trash of us. Don’t let go these pieces. We are not yet sure what they are for.