Ocean Vuong

I didn’t know the cost

of entering a song—was to lose

your way back.

So I entered. So I lost.

If we make it to shore, he says, I will name our son after this water. I will learn to love a monster.

He laughs but his eyes betray him. He laughs despite knowing he has ruined every beautiful thing just to prove beauty cannot change him.

How many kisses have we crushed to our lips in prayer—only to pick up the pieces?

But only a mother can walk

with the weight

of a second beating heart.

When they ask you

where you’re from,

tell them your name

was fleshed from the toothless mouth

of a war-woman.

My son, tell them

the body is a blade that sharpens

by cutting.

My mother said I could be anything

I wanted—but I chose to live.

In the museum of the heart

there are two headless people building a burning house.

Because the year is a distance

we’ve traveled in circles. Which is to say: this is how

we danced: alone in sleeping bodies.