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6.2
Irene Hsiao
Luna

Tonight I am building a trap for the moon. It is made of all the defunct things. Telephone wires fat with static. Unbent staples that have lost lost cat notices. Acrid fig buds kept from fruiting. They are as effete as I am. Exhausted blooms. We have all become convinced we are objets d'art. Nous nous parlons en francais to show that it is true to give us, too, some calculable distance from the weighted ground. I acknowledge it is not our calculations that will inveigle you, luna, mere shard or crust of my desire. I am learning about radar plotting to find you, moon. It's something men invented to map positions relative to other moving entities, which certes you and I each are. My sources tell me I need to know my speed and direction of travel. My sources tell me that relative to myself, any other object that does not deviate from its estimated bearing line poses a risk of collision. My sources tell me that, with proper plotting, I should know our time of closest point of approach. From apogee to perigee, this distance varies from 405,503 to 365,295 kilometers, a distance which increases by 3.82cm, on average, a year, a distance which, though miniscule on an astronomical level, steadily decreases our odds of accident. The heart, however, knows no damper to its longing. The mind makes its own mathematics. I know we will meet. I have plotted it using your own radiance as a measure. My faith will not go unrewarded. I will wait until it becomes clear as your own face. Clear as the vacancy of figs. Hard as the rust on the wire.

Irene Hsiao writes, dances, and worries a lot. Her book, Letter from Taipei, has just been published this January. Her writing has appeared in Word Riot, A Clean Well-Lighted Place, elimae, and others. She regularly contributes articles on dance to the SF Weekly and is appallingly promiscuous about sweets.
irenechsiao.wordpress.com