Ma, you cannot brush anymore
my hair is long
ing for some kind of cutoff
a wrap
from stretching shore to shore

How are you ma?
my child
didn’t get enough time
to see the world before I came along
You barely touched GPS on your way to the night market, before my words touched your tongue

Mother I can’t teach you the necessity, sometimes, of cruisin these waters in disguise
My face ships in a foreign choreo, streamlined. We use morse code here, for efficiency

My therapist asked if I could give you what you want now.
For me to be happy.
No I don’t.
For beauty pain and comedy to walk this tightrope.
These big words, you say.
A simple thing it looks but it is anything but simple
The ropes are crisscrossed in a net, a dome and fence

You have lived in a few jetties and some paces. I journey away from you.
I go so far “you almost broke the spinning bike today at the gym, ”
the old man next to me said. Why else would I be here?

Not to find my next Djinn, next to you
Carry you like I did when I was 5.
                              If there was ever a storm we will hold each other tightly.
Marooned in golden mornings, green at family brunches, not mine
I wish you were in one of the glasses here

I dream of banquets. I am hungry for stories where we are both in it.

Ma, I began to worry that I won’t recognize you in the airport
that you wither away like ghosts in a haunted house, who can’t even smell her own blood.

I water you, ma, before I got to sleep
Every morning, the words you sew bloom to my wig of the day.
This is how you stay evergreen.