by Sandra Beasley

                              Risley: Routine in which one

                               juggles the other on his feet.

Jun has dreamed fifteen years worth of escape

yet still wakes beside his sister, shadow

of his sunned skin, same bangs grazing mute brows.

He helps Bing sheathe her breasts in red silk tape;

she does not tremble.  He does not see her

trembling, Mama Jing’s dying bed recalled

with each cotton fold to cushion the small

of his back.  He suits his skin in silver,

chalks palm and soles.

     
                                    Could she forgive her son

for this nightly act of unconception?

Bing’s head, knees, tucked tight—Mama’s egg, dumb dot

of life—while Jun’s calves push, fishswim beyond

their birth.  Breath free just in that thin moment

between Bing falling and Bing being caught.

Originally appeared in Dogwood 2005