By L.Y. Rinn
Sons of mythos love their niángqīns
in sacrifices unimaginable, o pantheon
of filial piety: Mt. Tao, surgically cleaved
& uprooted to set an immortal mother
free; the debt of a three-year pregnancy
repaid in língchí, each self-slice a slab
of penitent flesh returned to a mortal mother.
Unlike immortal sons, the luxury of lifetimes
infinite escapes me. I love you as one does
with an hourglass on the horizon, which is
to say, in a way that will never suffice.
One that consciously, viciously compels
regret. Through the unspoken & the half
outreached, hesitating palm that fails to find
its way into your calloused own. Through
the fear I dare not name, nor even breathe
life into. To name is to birth is to curse—
one you cast when I was delivered
screaming, still reeling from the last loss
of a mother whose name I no longer know.
A curse broken & another branded afresh.
Will you, like the mortal mothers of mythos,
promise me another life on your deathbed?
One after the other, willingly & wretchedly
shackling ourselves to samsara’s ouro
boros cage: maw-mother swallowing
tail-daughter over & over & over again.
I’d trade nirvana three thousand times
over to be a child in your bosom again
because I love you more than liberation.
