Cry of the Stars

When my mother told me she loved me,
I thought I needed translation.

Sweetheart? she tried, but shook her head.

I looked it up: darling, baby—
Or word by word: heart, liver, treasure, cowrie.

Precious treasure of the liver. Sweet heart
of the child. A music box, a seashell, a dumpling, a blanket,
a pair of cupped hands, a cradle, a womb—

the heart, the liver, the baby
a box for safekeeping, but

is there anything safe about a baby?

Xinganbaobei, she repeated, drawing a circle
at her chest, opening it up, showing me
myself nestled inside, as vital as any viscera:

in me, of me, she said, my sweet baby,
the child of my heart. You know?

And didn’t I?

Late June, and by my apartment porch
the scent of flowered vines sends me back
eleven years, reeling, to a riot of mowed grass
and sunshine on skin:

I’m running through shifting shadows
with you again, while your mother
cuts tomatoes in the kitchen
and the white duck wanders the backyard.

Pale pollen on fingers, clear nectar
lingering on tongue-tips, we ran, breathless
and blurry—

Somewhere beyond the clotheslines I lost you:
dark curls disappeared into billowing white,
eclipsed by heat and wind.

Did I lie down and close my eyes
in the center of that bright and whirling world?

Have I slept for eleven years, or is it now
I am dreaming?

I think of your face behind fluttering sheets,
your mother’s voice at the patio door—

I turn; the wind drifts; I breathe
again, unlocked.