The stilettos of red wind

go on pecking at me,

at us.

We haven’t seen our mother in seven months.

She was taken away.

I could present evidence of

my mother—

kitchens tattooed onto her elbows

and wrists,

walking the dog at the crack of dawn

in her pajamas and slippers—

but instead I will tell you

of the red wind spirits

that carried her off

same as I have told the babies

my two sisters

again and again.

The babies know by heart

that goblins are stealing people

because goblins steal people

that’s what they do.

They don’t know of men

in numbered suits and wraparound visors,

men with large hands, large enough

to cover houses and neighborhoods.

They do not know about

the longitude of menace in real-time.

(every night

i go to sleep

and feel fire ants

crawling

on

my

skin

raising an empire)

One of the babies cracked open

her egg of fear, equal parts origin and shadow,

by asking—Where’s Mama?

The other baby, her sister, threaded the elegy—

When is Mama coming home?

That was seven months ago.

They don’t ask anymore.

They mutely pray at night

to keep the goblins

from abducting any other members of our family,

of any family, and I—

I give my glitchy brain

silent permission to shrink down

the colossal hands

into something common, something manageable,

and secretly I pray,

same as the babies.