I say we live in ocean | you say in sky
I say my mother’s people were whales hunted for their teeth
you say your father’s fathers were doves | landing in a line in the sugared fields
this much is true | my mother was a girl
mauled by dogs in a village near the sea | & after | in the blue heat
twisting loose the copper faucets | filling the house to the roof
your father was a boy who walked through stars
when he should have been walking home
a boy torn apart by wolves in winter | in the center of a busy street
the curse is | without lungs & without gills | where can she breathe
your father would stand so still at altars
so the angel’s wings became his wings
the curse is | the angel’s wings became his wings
all those years | I say | all those fish in my mother’s rooms
—all those furious wings