by Emma MiaoAt night, the Yangtze floods my veins with gold.
I goosebump the rain-stained balcony, white lines snaking up my tendrilled feet. White: the faint pattern on my belly, digging into me, through me. But I don’t know this yet: only know Mother calling from inside, her red hand beckoning. I know what she’d do. Fingerprint my eyes, flux herb water down my throat. Every night the house a museum & my body on display like the rabbit, eye-locked with the crown of the knife. Gleaming in the moonlight. The rabbit, like me, is soft, docile, ivory fur glossy, her legs bounding into the cable-bed snare. At dinner, Father clatters her bones on the glass table. Watches me knife red meat with streaked teeth. He smiles. My belly, gibbous, because I am a good daughter: my eyes cast in deference, my cheek red & streaked. I am a good daughter to suckle sweat, drudge in the trefoiled frost. The fate line on my palm nicked with scars. Good daughters spoon silence into their mouths, so I skewer the rabbit: chew, swallow. The lamp beside my bed is stained with Father’s eyes. The wallpaper a shredded maroon. But now: silence. The rain turned gold. I stick out my tongue. The flecks taste like rabbits. Mother, inaudible. I close my eyes, picture a gold sky. Give me your hands and I will bury them. Give me a river and I will swallow it whole. Give me a mirror and I will become the predator. We are the vessels of so many lies.
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June 2022
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