We Made Love in the Japanese Garden
the two of us loitering
in the corner
away from the tourists.
Lulled amid the bamboo screens
pools of carp, gabled roof lines.
Two geese flying.
The drip drip drip of slow water
from the bamboo pipe
rupturing the pond’s smooth skin.
You said you’d love me forever
but did not want this child.
She of the secret bessoming.
I made a pact with God
that what was lost would someday
come back as hyacinth.
Eight years later it takes hours
to land in Beijing
make the journey south to you.
You are beautiful, my daughter
four-years-old, love tangerines
are ringworm infested, have a bald spot
an island where lustrous
black tresses long to be.
I have painted you stories for your
journey to me.
The dark sea, the surreptitious boat
me trying to reach you.
My sad hands empty as pigeons.
The hummingbird’s cool breath.
You speak Cantonese.
At first the body’s own language of love
must make a nest for us.
Later, my small painting pegged to your wall
you ask why it took so long
to reach you.
I talk about big squalls, shipwrecks
nights with no stars in them
the boat with its capsizable keel
how I bargained with God
to keep a watchful eye on you—
oldest girl
three and a half long years in the orphanage
told God that I would treasure you always
like the orange carp in the happy pond
told God I would make good
on my treasonous past
the man who won his sensible way
over my vestibules
the secret transgression
the knowledge of fishes.
That what is lost
I shall will back to us
as psalm.
