Pearly White Petals 

Father, 

Pearly white, whiter than your magic 

white, dissevered, fragile petals, 

my vocal folds adhere to a wet, 

incarnadine tube that hides the kindred 

child, dreaming of luna moths, who 

gleam upon my solitary nights, 

a narrow passge fanning to a thousand winds, 

seeking to allay the wild waters in their roar.

Who hatches its innocence apart with raw hands?

Who drives in a laryngoscope to inspect its defects?

Do they not know infants' vocal folds are 

different?  But in error bids them 

live.  I guard my accent, surface in florid 

blooming tinge, like the morning's virgin dews, 

to entice Nature not to spare this island.  

I contend to wed things that never pleased before.  

My mucous membrane stretches across oceans.  

Mine chants a tide of prayers in sonorous tone

to make wishes come true.  

Mine the syrinx of coutless transnational flights.  

Love, Miranda