after Victoria Chang

The omen birds are sharp
in their auspicious bands.

But my eyes are still adjusting
to the new prescription:
the old one reversed.

*

Character I confuse, quarry or ghost.
Lucky days drain their oil
on a paper towel.

*

I follow nausea’s braid
downstream. My thoughts dam
the creeks of sleep.  
My mother’s warning: don’t be the poet
chasing light down a well.

*

Sometimes I scream in my head
& a little leaks onto my shoulder.

I can’t tell my voice from other voices
& other voices are always with me.

*

婆婆 could tell the future.
All it took was a hand on the stomach.

*

My selves speak different dialects
but read the same scripts.
They can never finish a sentence.

*

All my life I entered
through the back door.
How else could I have turned out?

*

No, I am not who I thought I was.

I must be the master of my mind.

*

There’s no reasoning with the past,
its feral silence.
I introduced it & it doubled
so now I must kill it.

The skin makes for a warm coat.