fill my thoughts with flowers

TITLE: "fill my thoughts with flowers"

AUTHOR: May Lin

fill my thoughts with flowers 

spent too much time thinking

about things that weren’t real

looking into eyes 

as green as nephrite jade 

two stones, two hands, 

two dim-witted minds like

the lightbulb that went out

under my father’s reading light

& maybe you were 

the boy who cried stone

the boy who chose silence 

because he couldn’t face the

pain in his temples,

the valleys in his head, 

caught back in his throat 

the voice of another, 

you’re just like your father. 

meekly, 

you’re just like your goddamn father.