And this is a poem for my parents
who are Hmong refugees from Laos.
Dear exile, never step back, never a last scent of plumeria.
When my parents left, you knew it was for good.
It's a herd of horses never to reclaim their steps.
You became a moth hanging down from the sun.
Old river calling to my mother kept spilling out of her lungs.
Ridgeline vista closed into the locket of their gaze.
It's the Siberian crane forbidden
to fly back after winter.
You marbled my father's face, floated him
as stone over the sea further every minute,
emptying his child years to the land.
You crawled back in your bomb.
It's when the banyan must leave and relearn
to cathedral its roots.