Over on the other side of the world, my māma’s home / is lonely, full of love. Her voice on
the other end of the phone / low as a dip in the cold, basin below the earth, low / like bass, like
the murmur in my chest, and shy, and faint, / footfall on clock-ice. Wéi? Māma // is low as the
moon, as space. I am praying for the stars to shine / beside her smile, which currently sits
cautious curled up precarious atop / her reading glasses and mainly in the dark. Wéi? // Wéi, nǐ
tīng dé jiàn wǒ ma? Are you there? À. Her voice low // as the blues, the shakier moments of
the day, as jelly legs, / as hands pressed to my stomach. Ng. She softens // for her mother,
because lăo lao has ears / and a seventy-five-year-old heart we dare not strum. Māma, / are you
okay? Wéi? What’s in a whisper / I can’t hear? The crackle of the phone vast. It’s as if / there
are tens of thousands of / elbows jostling between us. // I stay reaching. Wéi, nǐ tīng dé jiàn wǒ
ma? Where are your / brothers and your sisters? Lăo lao has ears / and a mouth they don’t like
to / soothe or tiptoe around, and a heart, spooked, / full of love. You dare not strum, but you
summon every / string in your body and place them gently in her hands. Māma, // I love you.
Wéi? Take care. What spooks a heart? Memory. / And aliens. Fighting a cosmic battle. And
there amid brushstroke and mountain rock, thick stone masks in family portrait at nondescript
restaurant / you send over WeChat. Guān Yīn, did you know/ my māma’s home is singing
the blues / in Mandarin, and sanded skin, and she doesn’t know / what to do with all the love /
blaring from the TV screen, and lăo lao has ears / and a flare-up heart, thundering, to the
rescue, / and our salvation, and / she says she will have wings, // her voice shrill, well-meaning,
superhero, invasion, fuming, / smoking out my māma’s voice? Lonely // ache together. Three
plus / generations. And tens of thousands of elbows. Where are our / brothers and our sisters?
The crackle of the phone vast. I am praying for the stars to shine. // Over on the other side of
the world, my māma / is low as the moon, as space, filling my head.