Thursday, February 19, 2015

China Moon




China Moon

On this night the moon, dressed in shadow robes
comes to lie with Hou Yi.

She reminds him how he saved the earth,
nocked his arrow in its bow,

then straight into the corona of eight of the nine suns
until all but one was bled of  heat.

She cries how sorry she is for opening the box
where he kept the seed of immortality,

swallowed it before he could share it with her,
which left her in her cold lunar bed.

She brings him moon cakes
brimmed with lotus sweetness,

 chrysanthemum tea, a poem,
 scorched by the heat of eight suns.


Photo courtesy of Peter Moore

Sunday, February 8, 2015

Waiting for Baby Hystad



 











Waiting for Baby Hystad

We are relearning lullabies,
take our aged voices out of storage,
dusting off angel, night-night, hush.

Your scan on the fridge
is held there by magnets as you are
by the pull to your father’s heart,

your mother’s – who comes back to visit us,
her old home, carrying you. Sleeps in her old bed
where she was first whispered,

slept then within my heart, as you within hers now,
your fingers fully formed, your lungs stronger,
your ear attuned to her voice.

Before she leaves she lets go
of all her childhood things,
takes the faded posters from the wall

of moments when she shone:
Carousel, My Fair Lady, Miss Saigon,
ready for this new stage, to mother you,

while your father dreams
in the too-long days of duty
of coming home soon,

driving you both across
the wheat fields of North Dakota
golden as the hair on his two darlings’ heads.


Photo of Hystad ranch courtesy of Peter Moore


©  Geraldine Mills   4/10/13