Miraculous
Monster, please reconsider this angry tone of voice.
Even more, won’t you sit next to me, in an impromptu tête-à-tête,
won’t you, please? Monster, there are things to consider before
you eat a piece of rotten fruit, such as, do I have a liver?
Do I have two kidneys? How many chambers are in my heart?
Can I raise my right arm above my head like this? And
does this piece of wood remind me of a chandelier? You are lovely,
that’s true, you are lovely without being loved, so that’s nice,
it really is, it makes me want to do jumping jacks, and although
I am doing jumping jacks right now as we speak, I will do very
particular jumping jacks for you. This I will do by applauding
when my hands reach their penultimate height. Does it please you?
Even more, does it make you want to fall asleep? That’s good
to know. Because, Monster, you have no right
hand but you have fingers, but they are inside the chambers of your heart,
on the ground like storm-battered, wind-torn, tree-top limbs,
and guess what, you have five chambers in your heart, that’s confusing,
ain’t it? That tadpole you swallowed the other year in jest, he’s a full-fledged
frog, he’s lonely, he’s old, he uses your pinky as a cane, he’s a philosopher,
asserting that the motion of the soul is relative to the motion of inert matter,
and that dying and love-making is one son of my bitch heck of a
flim flam humdinger, you dig, or have you dug, or will you dig,
or are you digging, and to the center of the earth,
or for the space of a coffin, either way, why don’t you, won’t you, oh,
won’t you let him loose? So he can view the sun, contemplate a fresh metaphor
as it splits like an asterisk behind Mount Rushmore? You’re too kind,
you’re too much. But you have no orifices, Monster, so you asked
me, how is it that you will cry? You are doing it right now, I said.
And what was it you were doing? Just walking, talking, taking a stroll,
migrating. It’s time to let loose the awful, awful polka-dotted truth,
so here it comes, head’s up: You will never perform a jumping jack, let alone jump,
you will never hand-stand, cough, or high-five. But Monster, did you know,
these salt-sized diamonds, this disassembled bracelet, these are yours?
Reveal your left ankle, Monster, it reminds me of that miracle
we performed last week.
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Christopher Kang