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Mama Mada
Resentment Near The Jade Stairs
by Li Po
Dew whitens the jade stairs.
This late, it soaks her gauze stockings.
She lowers her crystal blind to watch
the breaking, glass-clear moon of autumn.
Plait
by Em m a Sim o n
The trick is to hold three braids in two hands
and ignore the logistics of mornings.
Wind the first over the second, then cross
the third over the first, and so on. Don’t get cross
with excessive fidgeting, or arguments slipping
like hoarded minutes out of hand.
Keep a zen-like calm in your fingers. Remember even school mornings
don’t last forever. Focus on this unremarkable Tuesday morning,
the soft nape and collar crease beneath the wonky plait.
Let the yin yang of its criss cross
weave a tender magic, like a proverb handed
across the generations, mourning that there is
never enough time, or enough hands.
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