Besides a lie / I own nothing.
–Liu Xiaobo
Cloud was the name of my gray horse
I collect dollhouses
I stand to inherit an igloo and my mother’s old polar bear collection
I harbor all the melting ice caps in my mouth
Sea lions hide from the polar bears in my cavities
My baby teeth grew in white gold, which is to say yellow
I am a sculptor at heart
I’m big in Singapore
In the third grade I sculpted a life-sized wooly mammoth out of melted down
wedding bands
These days, I make swans from tin foil that once wrapped the cheese sandwiches
mother made, Sisyphus written in mustard
I never loved you
All the polar bears are crying because you are so beautiful and warm
They say it’s killing them
The seals are synchronized swimming again, like sad old ladies
in frilly bathing caps
My grandma nicknamed me Lemonade because I was yellow and ridged and buttery as
popcorn in that yellow sweater
Twelve years of ballet
And my pet sea lion lived to be one hundred and seven
She never, ever died
No one ever dies