to be worthy of my father’s grief? Of the kind of obsession that nearly drowns

us? Do I need to tell you that I am my father’s son for you to know only one of us

can survive? How much do I need to tell you about how a good son dies too

before I can make you believe Daedalus circled until his throat was as raw

as any featherless bird?

A THOUSAND CARDINALS

Imagine my first moon

wasn’t a moon at all

but a crescent incision

in my mother    Imagine

my disappointment

when I realized no light

would ever be so full

as the gore I passed through

just to be born

If I am ever as successful

at leaving as I aspire to be

I suppose it would go like this

I decide to stay           and then a bloom

of cardinals peel themselves

from my back            I splinter into a thousand dead

relatives

just like that            I’m my mother’s son         all over again

What was the last thing you loved enough

to open something that was not a border

I was born and the scar makes my mother

exactly the island that her parents fled

Every sacrifice begets a question

What would you give to never have to flee again?

I mean         my father asked my mother to not teach me Spanish

So I would not be confused            my mother traded her tongue

and I sound as if I am only his son          What sacrifice          to say allegiance

to my small dark mouth        and not be understood        on purpose

wash the moon        clean of crimson         until I was barely born at all

In order for me to exist       somebody has to have had sex

In order for me to exist       one thing has to be at the gate

rattling       until answer

At the end of sex a sacrifice has to be made unless a sacrifice was made during

I do both             just to be safe           I give and give my tongue

and I am my mother’s son

because the tongue keeps showing up in my mouth

I want to stop           being             this way        I ask

what it would take to be a sacrifice worthy of the sacrifices that precede me

a trail of wings through which the sun appears to always be in retreat

I am placed in a school that costs my parents so much

The nature of sacrifice is recursive         we give up

home after home             a child is left at the brink

of what is known    and we trust an illogical love    that I could bring myself back

I want to know when enough has been given  I want to know when I’m allowed

to stop

I ask my birth          to forgive me        when I cannot ask my mother

I leave a child         at the edge of my mouth         dare anyone Wash the moon