My Mother Upon Hearing News of Her Mother's Death by Cathy Linh Chei

She opened her mouth and a moose came out, a donkey, and an ox—out of her mouth, years of
animal grief. I lead her to the bed. She held my hand and followed. She said, Chêt rôi, and like that,
the cord was cut, the thread snapped, and the cable that tied my mother to her mother broke. And
now her eyes red as a market fish. And now, she dropped like laundry on the bed.

The furniture moved toward her, the kitchen knives and spoons, the vibrating spoons—they
dragged the tablecloth, the corner tilting in, her mouth a sinkhole. She wanted all of it: the house
and the car too, and the flowers she planted, narcissus and hoa mai, which cracked open each
spring—the sky, she brought it low until the air was hot and wet and broke into a rain—

the torrents like iron ropes you could climb up, only I couldn't. I was drowning in it. I was swirled
in. I leapt into her mouth, her throat, her gut, and stayed inside with the remnants of my former
life. I ate the food she ate and drank the milk she drank. I grew until I crowded the furnishings. I
edged out her organs, her swollen heart. I grew up and out so large that I became a woman, wearing
my mother's skin.