Luna

Unlike you, Khaled, I was told to look
at the moon, know her hard, decipher
her changing countenance so I could learn
to know myself, but disobeyed that injunction
too, worshipped instead her lesser twin.

My native tongue has only one word
for both moon and month, one luna
that begins in a sliver of flesh, blooms
into a woman of unrivaled beauty,
then shrivels back into herself,

same luna who, invisible in the sun’s wings,
tallies our desires, cadences our breaths, wards
the blood cord of sisterhood. But I knew nothing of desire
or blood, so when, at fourteen, I emerged
from the unlit bathroom with crimson streaks

on both thighs, I was convinced my body had split open
to let death in. The sight sent my grandmother & aunts
into a teary glee refueled throughout the evening
with shots of plum brandy, frenzied Perinitas, and toasts
to sister Luna and her kind visit to our house. Nobody

told me I was going to be fine.
Later, as a student, when I rode grimy trains
among drapes of smoke and belligerent
drunks, I’d rest my eyes on her shaped brightness,
dreaming of life on the lit side of the Iron Curtain.

From this new continent to which I’ve fastened
my life, some nights I think I see my daughter,
unfinished still, in the ashen crater below the moon’s
right eye—but my Romanian book of myths
insists it’s Cain sloshing his jug of blood.