Marshmallow

& if tomorrow, something must exile my body, 

God, let it not be the light i leak into my people's 

bodies. Let it not be what i poise into this 

Chrysalis i placed on their palm.

may we live in our dreams before being struck

awake like ember does to darkness. if i were 

marshmallows. i mould myself a tomb, and carry 

my poems into it. i watch it melt into a prayer, to

God, for a home learning to survive from

a ruin that measured their existence backwards— 

{calculate: count existence and deduct the number of bombs dropped on it.}

say it equals the litany escaping 

the lips of my people. 

my mother would say:

‘bi a o ku, ise o tan.’ 

meaning: 

‘if life hasn't left you, you're still what

 blurs your imagination and reality.’

i repeat it backwards:

‘reality and imagination blurs you,

if life hasn't left you.’

i picked up a pebble on my brother's

 grave, & kissed it—a way of telling 

 him to smile for the camera. his sepia

hand, holding my mother's apron,

a way of  holding on to memories of him living

leaving this world.