climb up on my shoulders
crouch, i bend my knees, hands 
out, ready for mass, ready for
carry, climb up on my
spine, crooked, wavering a symptom
of how damn hard i try 
weight, just a minute, rain
down, over brows into sight
despite glasses, clarity isn't ready
for commitment, glass fogs in bad
weather, you like it or not 
hot, bury my body, tuck
the soil in close to my thighs
hide the collarbone, the breasts, the
danger to myself, at night
the princess is always left to defend
her own castle, second wind flattens 
cattails before girls
unready to die, quiet
into the eye of a hurricane 
named after me, see how the tops
of all the trees sway in the breeze
i breathe?

every day i sit 
in class is for a chance to
save a life like yours

ama calls him
by all the names he has ever gone by
tao ge, mr. chan, han ting, alex, calixto 
in hopes his eyelids will flutter at one of them
sometimes, only "good morning" will do 
or a wave
the correct response to these pleasantries seem
unaffected by the rot 
encoded deeper than sense of self, language, or love
when the world begins to lose its 
grip on my wrists
will you knock on the glass, mouthing, miming,
wave wave good morning wave wave good morning 
ignoring the beeping, the maze of tubes ransacking my skin, 
will you call me by all my names
& wait for an answer?

akong dreams of his mother
who is not dead
she has an entire harvest of sunset-colored
mangoes gathered up in her hands
brown, the way all loving soil under coconut trees color
in evening light
he is in davao, shirt sleeve drenched in beer & the reprise of The Phantom of the Opera,
hometown that he hasn't left yet for stolen land
everything, the gnat clouds and lumber and street children, is his birthright
akong tosses & turns against his mother's perfume
she has dropped the mangoes by his feet and now strangles him with her lovely, calloused hands
the villagers gather to watch this familial tragedy as akong labors for breath, clutches at the air once, twice
chanting fills his ears
Just a urine test, the onlookers say together
at his feet, a little girl with two braids claps to the beat
just a urine test the catheter is in and out just a urine test
akong closes his eyes but
they are already closed all the way

my fingers scrape the burlap bottom 
of my bag of tricks. days like these,
the blank page chews up an entire eraser,
the waiting crowd quiets,
the poet in me dies,
nothing rhymes

there's a cactus where my lungs were supposed to be
and i think Someone made a mistake when They put it there
i understand that breathing involves air but
there's a desert where my stomach is
and the only mystery is how thirsty my gut gets
when the sky isn't falling
when the ground is a sheet of unbroken glass 
steaming under a big bedroom eye hovering above the still wind vanes
my bones beg for a storm
they curve, brittle and wise, ready for fury
untested as they are in mild weather
my toes press into pavement 
straws in sand
searching for a reason to fight the gale
that doesn't come
but scarecrows were built for waiting

my grandma disappeared into the crook of her elbow
i stayed perfectly still
though a better granddaughter might have followed 
into the rabbit hole 
endless, inevitable, dark as it is
but such a place that makes my grandma say,
"i'm so tired,"
is beyond the limits of my courage
maybe (could it be?)
​my love

mangoes are my favorite metaphor 
​for being a daughter who
doesn't listen
thin skinned, sweet, but messy
doesn't bruise with impact 
absorbs the blow like she expected it 
never argue with her
she gets between all your teeth and won't let go
you'll smell like her for hours after
it is always this way with mangoes.
easy to break into, hard to escape from
she'll turn you into a regretful thief
or disappointed mother
heavy on the branch with misleading weight
couldn't fill a stomach like an apple would
mostly seed
mostly promise
still unseen

jetlag reminds me that it is midnight 
somewhere
sometimes
it's in the faint orange glow 
of my childhood bedroom
the penciled-on pink paint now
apologetically covered up in lavender
my body is a dollar sign twisted up in sheets
but sleep is expensive 
i can't afford to close my eyes again
another dream in which i say things i don't
mean might be lurking by the curtains
the mattress yields in the middle where
the bed frame has broken and it
tries to swallow up my twitching
i let it 
as much as i can let myself fall into anyone's arms
slide down another throat
into another belly
let acid peel back my skin
Christmas morning
i wonder what's under there
if anything has changed 
or grown up

my tombstone will read,
"died of embarrassment, 
clumsiness,
unrequited love,
writers' block,
mosquito bites,
​fear of heights,
poetic injustice,
flashbacks,
forgotten passwords,
laughter,
& other natural causes"