The call of an endangered bird. Peach-pitted,
abandoned of blush.
My mother with curled bowl-cut bangs, pink gingham, barrette symmetry
and me. The anxiety of cells in another,
the upright walking once-wombed.
Who moves. Who leaves. Who returns.
And who does not—in so many words,
a blossom end.
The things we ask of each other. The things we do instead.
Left-hand turns in the dark, left to fate.
