Tectonic plates of memory crash
close to the filament of a blooming
rose that sits with its three sisters over
over the midnight flora, as I prepare
to rest my head over a pillow they collide

the stitchery of the past lifts off
and circles like Angeles the crown of my head
I follow the morning and
I peek into a 9:00 am mass to listen to prayers. I try to find my grandmother so I look at the same row she would sit in. In a different city, in a different church, in another bench but instinctively look at the third row on the right. There is an other women bowing like the others as the priest cues with his words. She is not my grandmother. They are not my grandmothers but they are someone else’s   If I had opened my eyes here
on a hilll in Haebangchon as did
my dear friend 15 years my senior
Then one of them might know my name
but they smile as if they do

The evening prepares to fully gulp
the sun, the car engines zoom contorting the sound scape and twisting gravel into their menacing rubber wheels

I have been well positioned by your love
picked up and delivered over my own fire’s hearth so close I was fanned
by your bellow into the firebox and that is why I am warm
my flames powerful and controlled
enough to set afire the thin veils of deceit
I practice cracking and melting fake plastic trees
I watch their flames burn dark. dark. Darkness leaves my hearth it no longer stays

there is nothing to chase
to fill you
so there is
only giving

Tight glam rock pants are back
mullets  have made a comeback
with the ladies and short fringes
are all the rage
curly hair is edging in

put everything behind
you. they are
good lessons to springboard
from. Put
everything behind.
everything
in your life are lessons
to springboard into
the now- springboard
into putting
a little more of everything within
your life
Springboard–
this is
your life.