Desire Is The First

By Bliss Cua Lim

Desire is the first to be colonized
and the last to be freed.

Before and behind me,
my strong, scarred mothers,
weak only where their men were concerned.

How long before I learned what was owing to you,
what was owing to me,
brought up to believe that loneliness
was lack of that which echoes in operas I sing poorly,
love, which brought all heroines to death.

No, we must not seize pleasure at each other's expense:
how could we then condemn
that mindless ease made possible by
the unlamented labor of those without song?

Too many dare to be beautiful but not to be brave.
But sisters surround me on ancient afternoons,
calling out canticles with throats thick with tears:
god has not responded, but we must sound our power.