Palinode

Your mother enters the poem

with her sadness intact.

When your mother enters

the poem, should she be

a strict, sad, hardworking, or

immigrant mother? Your mother

enters the poem wearing

all her animal-print

items at once, laughs holding

a leopard-print lamp. Your

mother enters the poem laughing,

asks for compensation. Shouldn’t

she be paid for inspiring

you? Your mother reads

the poem and tells you she isn’t

an immigrant. Student visa,

she corrects your

language. In many places,

you keep her sadness

intact despite the hazy

quality of your childhood

memory. Pay your mother

to display her sadness across

the pages of a poem.