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.
