ABOUT

CONTENTS

EDITORIAL

ARCHIVE

LAGNIAPPE

MAST

SUBMISSIONS

It chews feet, always at night. The victim wakes up screaming at his footless stumps or never wakes up again. I'm its next target. I know. My soles tingle with a premonition. Drink tea to keep myself awake, determined to search for its nest and destroy it before it gets me. A smiling dresser sits in the middle of the kitchen. This is it, its apparition hidden behind the doors. I lunge, sword in hand.

6:00 a.m. The first lotus is located in anus and the soul body awakens before the alarm goes off.

Reach and press the button. "No, Mother, no!" Ayden roars, sits up, then falls back to sleep. Di is still nursing, his cheeks in and out, swift like a rabbit's breath. Pull out gently, putting a finger between his gums before they clamp down on the nipple. He grunts, rubs his eyes with fists, legs up in the air. Nudges to the breast, eyes closed, mouth open. A kiss on his wide fuzzy forehead. Sit up. Hide the clock in the sock drawer, so it won't break someone's toes with its sharp corners. Knead breasts, push and pull. Milk sprays in all directions. Di needs three bottles for the morning. He's stuffing his left foot in his mouth, gurgling happiness. "Such an oral fellow. Always chewing something," I complained to Heidi at her son's birthday party. "Better than anal," she replied. We laughed. Her son was digging into his first cake with bare hands.

Still dark outside, but the sky is showing a sliver of a shark's belly along the horizon. Does memory have colors? And dreams? Lately my dreams are flooded with torrents. Children strapped to chairs float past adults at cocktail parties, their black gowns dancing in white water. No one seems to hear the cry. No one pays attention to the drowning.
Milk begins to trickle, then stops. Yank and squeeze. Only a few drips come out. The bottle only half full. Try later, after tea and toast. Di throws his legs down, arches his back and farts. Take off his pants, lay the dirty diaper on the floor, and hold him still between my knees. He groans and grunts. Smell rises, pee wetting my right knee and foot. Look down at the diaper. Good Di. Six months old, already regular like a clock. With Wei, it's been a daily battle. Prune juice, pear nectar, water, suppository, Q-tips, and belly massages, still have to dig it out with my fingers. It's heartbreaking to see him try to push it out and hold it in at the same time, hair wet from the struggle and shame.

What is he afraid of, I often wonder? Is it possible that fear is programmed into his genes? The day he was conceived, I started having violent dreams: mass massacres, bodies roasted alive, babies gnawed to the bones by rats. He'd often stop whatever he is doing, and listen to some inaudible sound at distance, his chocolate brown eyes glazed with doubts. What is it, mama, what is it? And I can only hold his hands to keep him from slipping further into the abyss. One day, after I dug out his stool hard as rocks, streaked with blood, his babysitter gave me a bottle of laxatives she brought from China. I shook my head. Wei has to overcome this by himself. He must not become used to the medicine and depend on it for the rest of his life.

Di squirms, kicks, cries, his chest puffing in and out as he hollers into his father's ear. Ayden groans and turns to the side. Wipe his behind with Kleenex. Give him a snorter and run to get warm water. Wei calls it blue ice cream. Di screams when I use it to suck out his snot, but loves to chew it. Sponge his eyes, cheeks, nose, hands, feet, and bottom. Baby moisturizer on his face, Vaseline on his penis, then diaper and clothes. His stomach has folds, thighs full of dimples. I pinch and tickle. He curls with laughter, pulling my finger into his mouth.

No, no, Mama has dirty hands. Insert the snorter into his mouth again, and bring the bucket and dirty diaper to the sink. Dump the water, wash the cloth, put the basin back in the corner. Clean hands with soap. Everyone had stomach flu. First throw up, then diarrhea. Only Di hasn't caught it yet. When Wei soiled his fifteenth diaper within six hours, and his stool turned pink, I called the hospital. The nurse said no food for twenty-four hours. Pray that Di will never get it. This little wolf seems hungry all the time.

6:30. The second body is the negative mind, protects by telling the danger or loss.

Wei calls from his room. "Go home, mommy, go home." Run to his bed. Jumps up and into my arms. "Milk," he says, "red." Carry him to bed, next to Di. Pour two bottles of organic juice, diluted with water. Heat them in the microwave for ten seconds. Wei likes things room temperature, including ice-cream. Asks me to heat up water melon or he won't touch it. Fill the kettle and turn on the stove. Turn on the 6:30 news. Floods continue in Mozambique. People living in treetops. A woman gave birth to a daughter before a helicopter rescued them. The American pilot flipped his thumb, a triumphant gesture, not knowing it meant something obscene to the Africans.

Both boys lie in bed safely drinking juice. Di looks proud holding his own bottle. Take off Wei's diaper. He has two potties, stands on them to wash his hands and brush his teeth. Occasionally sits on it with his pants and diaper on. Two and a half years old, still terrified of the monster in the hole. "Just let him soil his pants several times and he'll want to use the potty," a friend advised. Tried once, but stopped when I saw the shame in his eyes. Run to his room. Turn off his humidifier. Take out clean pants, shirt, socks from the dresser. Change his clothes while he sucks his bottle in peace. More news from the "Morning Edition." Upper seventies today, 39 degrees higher than normal. A six-year-old boy found his uncle's gun in a shoebox and shot his classmate at school.

Wei lays the empty bottle on the floor and pulls me to his train stations. We play. Screams whenever the trains run off the track, blue veins bulging on the sides of his neck. Quick-tempered. Three Leos in a den, Wei, Di and me, our birthdays only a week apart. Di cooing and kicking in bed. The kettle whistles. Run to the stove. Make a pot of Pau d'arco herbal tea, a pot of organic decaffeinated Earl Grey. Both Wei and Di screaming. Run to Di. Face down, turned over, sprawling on the bed. Sit him up and surround him with pillows and toys. Di grabs an airplane and puts it in his mouth. Wei throws the trains and tracks in the air. Take his hand and walk to the easel. Open cans of paint. Dips brushes into silver, black and blue. His paintings pile high on top of the piano, numbered and dated. For his sixty-fifth birthday, his father asked Ayden for an after-shave. Couldn't believe the old man really wanted such a humble gift. Framed Wei's best art in golden wood. The birthday boy snorted and said why we bothered asking him what he wanted if we wouldn't give what he requested. Good point!

Take out pizza and chicken to thaw. Wei loves pizza for lunch at the day care. Calls his teacher Svetlana Stetlana. Calls Tubbytubby for Telytubby, snack for snake, bubbles for grapes, Bread for Fred, black Cheerio for tire swing, red milk for juice. Makes me laugh. He's good with words, with naming. I had knelt on the floor going though dictionaries, Chinese, English, Hebrew, searching for a perfect name for each of my children. Named the first one after Wang Wei, the finest Tang poet and painter in the 8th century, and the second with Di, its character for enlightenment, its sound similar to the word for younger brother. Chinese believe a good name makes magic, whereas a bad one can be a curse to a child every time the name is uttered. Indeed, Wei's first sentence made me laugh and cry. We were driving home into the sunset, after a long picnic on the bank of St. Croix. He was nursing, about to fall asleep. Suddenly he looked up from my breast, pointed at the blazing orange horizon, and shouted. "Look, sky on fire."

7:00. The positive mind, a vehicle that carries us from shore to shore. Rushing from one place to another, we often lose our destiny.

Pick up the bottles from the floor and wash them. Detergent stings hands. Skin peels. Fungus eats away fingers. Scars from cleavers, falling objects, hot grease, frost bites. Grew up watching grandma and mother soak their fungi feet in medicine water. "Cure is impossible," the doctor said as he examined the powdery toenails. "You can take the pills that might damage your liver, $800, at your own cost. Insurance won't cover it, and it may not work. Since you're pregnant, it's out of the question." "Other choice?" I asked. "You can remove them permanently," he said. "You mean PERMANENTLY?" I asked. "Yes." He looked at me without blinking. "But you'll have no pain."

To keep nails or pain, that is not an option, I chanted as I hobbled along the Nicollet Mall to the bus stop. Men and women in business suits passed by. They glanced at me, looked away, glanced at me again. The wind pressed my thin summer dress against the eight-and-a-half pregnant stomach, showing the protruding belly button. Pain is my best companion since memory began. It's a good thing, as grandma used to say. Sharpens the body and clears the mind.
Open a jar of apples and bananas for Di. Grind some pear and add brown rice powder. Wash grapes and strawberries. Cut the watermelon. Di crying. Sprawling on the bed again. Wants to crawl, but his arms can't support his trunk. When he's down, he becomes furious. Pick up Di and calls Ayden.
"Almost 7:30. Time to get up."

"Daddy is still tired," he moans and covers his head with the blanket. "Sorry to hear that. Now get up, please." "Mother, mother," he moans loudly, his hands flailing in the air. "Daddy is not feeling well. He's still weak from diarrhea. Help, mother, help." "Stop being a sissy. Don't you want to be a man?" He sits up instantly, flexing his arms and puffing his chest. "Look at these muscles," he shouts. "How could you call me a sissy? How could you ever doubt I'm not a man?" "Good," I laugh, thrusting Di in his arms. "Put them to good use."

I walk to the far corner where the fish tank stands. Turn on the light, unpluck the heater, sprinkle a pinch of flakes into the water. Am I too harsh? Ayden does look pale, his eyes puffy. Should I have some pity and let him sleep? But who pities me? Who sees me running around the house like a headless hen, eyes dimmed and dry, ears buzzing from dizziness? "But you're the mother, the professional," Ayden says when I complain. Wei climbs on the bed. "Bokertov," he says in Yiddish. Ayden scoops him into his other arm and sings, "Daddy's twooooooo boys."

Open the refrigerator. Confucius said that a full stomach leads to a lustful mind. Wonder what he'd say about a stuffed refrigerator. On the top shelf are two cartons of cow milk, rice milk, soymilk, prune juice, apple cider, ginseng tea, half an apple, a jar of baby food, three bottles of human milk. Bags of bread sit in the middle, some of them two weeks old. The second shelf holds three boxes of tofu, two bags of smoked tofu, pickles, preserved mustard green, bean sprouts, nava cabbage, bowls of leftover rice, pasta and salmon on top of one another to save space. Eggs, fruit, cans of soda, and vegetables that can't fit in the drawer are stuffed on the bottom. And the freezer. Every time I open the door, things fly out: fish, chicken, ribs, beef, dumplings, springs rolls, pasta sauce, sausages. They fall on my chest and toes, knocking out my breath. Chinese say food goes hand in hand with sex. Drink, eat, man, woman, these are greatest human desires. The West believes food craving is a red flag for sex troubles. The sexually starved body devours food as a substitute. Hmm!

7:45. The fifth lotus grows in the throat. If you speak only from there, your words come out blunt. Alas! The head always tries to reach heaven while our feet are deep in the mud.

Breakfast now spread on the table: nine-grain bread, crackers, Cheerios, breadsticks, baby food, cut fruit. Jam, almond butter, soy margarine. Everything organic. Pay triple prices for it at the Whole Foods. Each time I chop them up on the cutting board, I tell myself with clenched teeth: You'd better be worth it, worth it, worth it. Ayden puts Di in the crib and walks around picking up rags, toys, food, and crumpled Kleenex from the floor. He can't eat or sleep unless each toy is back in the trunk, every book on the shelf, every dish washed. His obsession stresses him out, but keeps the apartment tidy and clean. He finds a Cheerio in a crack between floorboards and pops it into his mouth. Can't bear wasting food. Once he ate something he found near the couch and ran to the bathroom gagging. Heard him brushing teeth frantically. Asked what was wrong. Finally said he thought it was a cookie Wei had thrown away. But it was a shit ball that had rolled under the couch, hardened then stepped on. The footprints made it look like an Oreo…

Things we trip on as parents.

Once Di wailed for two hours non-stop. Minds shattered. Thinking murder. plunging out the window. Shoved the howling thing to the father. Ran to the bathroom. Head between knees. Can't go on. Must go on. Deep breath. In and out. Wailing approaching. Door pushed open. Father peeked in. Baby in arms. Tears in eyes. Perhaps he needs more milk? Screaming from the toilet. No more milk. Get out. Out.

Then I lost my voice.

That night I dreamed I had to die by swallowing nails. Didn't want to but had no choice. Searched for a quick death, but nothing available. Wei and Di cried, clinging to my thighs. Ayden pulled them away. I wept, ashamed of feeling pain.

Wei walks over announcing he's hungry. Put him in the highchair. Bring a knife, water, cups and the teapot to the table. Put a bib around his neck. The toaster jumps. Rush to get the toasts. Bump into Ayden. His arms around my shoulders. Chunky muscles on the biceps. Smell of warm flesh. "What about some tender care love?" he says. Smile. Peck him on the cheek and thrust the toast into his hands. "Butter while still hot, would you?"

Pizza melting on the counter. Scrape off the cheese with chopsticks. "What are you doing?" Ayden asks. "Wei is allergic to dairy product." "What nonsense! I grew up drinking milk, eating pizza and ice cream. This is America. We grow big and strong on dairy." I give him a look. "It didn't seem to help you that much." "What do you mean?" he growls. "I'm huge. Right, son?" He turns to Wei. Wei waves his fists and flexes his arms like his father. "Yes, Daddy, we're huge, huge girls." "No, 'boys'," Ayden corrects him with a roar."

I laugh. "But our son is allergic to milk. It makes him constipated and vomit, his nose always congested. American kids have the highest rate of ear infection on earth. Do you know the culprit is milk? In fact, you're also allergic to it. That's why you're so gassy. Cow milk is designed for calves, not humans." Ayden looks around as if looking for help. "You can say whatever you want, but I ain't quitting ice-cream. If it were really that bad, they'd have told us so. Right, Wei? Shall we sing the song: "You scream, I scream, and we all scream for," he makes a gesture, and Wei joins him from the highchair, "ICE CREAM."

"Great, just great!" I mutter and plant three chunks of Chinese beef stew deep into the pizza. Wei and Di will grow up true Americans. That's inevitable. But I can sneak some Chineseness into them. The easiest way is through mouth. They'll love dumplings, noodles, tofu and rice along with hot dogs, pizza and ice cream. They'll speak some Chinese, hopefully, even if it comes with an accent.

Turn on the oven to 450 and slide in the pizza. Di shakes the crib bars as he tries to stand. Pick him up and put him on a maple wood highchair. $198 from Treasure Island. When we saw the price, we gasped and drove to Toys R Us. The plastic chairs were cheaper, but really nasty. We looked at each other. Remembered how my friend's husband refused to buy toys because of the fear that plastic might poison his son and make him queer. Told Ayden the story. He had a good laugh and we went back to Treasure Island for the chair.

Put a bib on Di. Plastic. It's the 21st century. Who on earth can avoid synthetics? Di pounds the board for food. Throw down some puffed rice and a strawberry. He stuffs them in his mouth. Crushes with his tongue. Tries to swallow. Coughs. Spits. Cries. Give him water. Sneak a spoonful of apple and banana sauce in his mouth. Wei eats the toast, watching "The Dragon Tale" on PBS. Peel grape skin for Di, to take off the pesticide on the surface. Ayden hands me the buttered toast. "For you, Mother." "Thanks. Do me a favor, stop calling me Mother, please." "But you are the Mother, mother of the house." He looks up, sincerely perplexed. "What else should I call you?"

Bend to drink Pau D'arco tea. I used to have a name, dear, I say silently. Since when it disappeared from your dictionary? Tea too hot. Suck in air to cool lips. Learned how to tolerate heat and cold since a little girl. Learned to cook since six, to lift a sizzling wok off the stove with bare hands. Learned to pick vegetables, chop wood, wash clothes in cold water. Learned to keep blisters and frostbites to myself. See Ayden's frown. He can tolerate burping and wind passing, discuss in details about his bowl movements during a meal, and return his half-eaten food back to the dish plate if he doesn't like the taste. But can't stand the sound of slurping. "You need to learn some table manners," he once told me after we dined with his parents in a Chinese restaurant. I looked at the map of stains on his shirt, where he had dropped chicken, shrimp and vegetables during the meal, and burst out laughing into his face. Ayden curls his lips to mock the sound of my tea drinking. I smile. Not that I don't have table manners. He'll just have to wait until I don't have to pour scorching food down my throat. But that's unlikely to happen, because I love hot stuff. Ever heard of this Chinese saying? The boiled tea is only 100 centigrade, but a Chinese has a mouth of 101 degrees.

8:10. The arc body obeys no rules of nature. When we have a headache, we press our temples with fingers. When our radiance gets thin, we compensate with ego.

The tea is supposed to kill the Candida yeast that grows in my stomach and intestines. My nutritionist Simone said when antibiotics and junk food kill the good bacteria in the body, Candida comes in, producing toxins that cause fatigue, headache, depression, yeast infection, obesity, arthritis, and other diseases. I must take the tea four times a day, plus vitamins, mineral oils and other supplements made by Shaklee, in order to kill the Candida, to cure my fungi nails, athlete's foot, gas pain, backache, memory loss, fatigue, constipation, diarrhea and joint swelling. "And no cheating, if you want your health back," warned Simone sternly. "Candida is very very stubborn."

I did it for a month. My stomach growled and churned. Farting uncontrollably. Complained to Simone that it was becoming a torture to sit in front of the students. "Great!" she said. "The dying Candida is making toxins. Stick to it. It will get better." I did, until the bill came. I cut the pills from three to once a day. It is not right to pay four hundred dollars a month for a promise that I might have normal toenails. I didn't tell Simone about the reduction. But she called after a month asking if I'd been forgetting the pills, so I confessed. She was very concerned, and wanted me to talk to Mary, a Candida expert. We agreed to have a three-way phone conversation, but I missed two appointments in a row. Simone pointed out that my Candida had a full comeback, and I must resume the full program. Absolutely no cheating this time.

Di's food is all gone. He ate some, spat out some, crushed most of it, and swept the rest on the floor. Now he roars like a warrior, watermelon juice dripping from his fists, arms. Wei is also done with his toast. He looks like a fox with his jam whiskers. Unfasten the bibs. Take Wei to the sink to wash up. Screams that I get his mouth and nose wet. "Don't be such a tight ass," I say. "Excuse me," Ayden shouts from the table. I laugh and dry him with a paper towel. Take Di to the sink. Wet his shirt but he loves it. Change his diaper. Screams and squirms. Pin the thrashing body down with one hand and fasten the diaper with the other. Whistle to distract him. Di reaches up to my lips to catch the sound, laughing. Secure the diaper.

Put him on the floor, next to Wei, in front of the toy basket. Wei builds a tower with alphabet blocks. Di grabs one and stuffs it in his mouth. Wei snatches it and hits him on the head. "That's my A. A is for airplane. Fly me to California." Di turns to me, his lips pulled down by the sorrow. I scoop him up. "Weiwei, please don't hit your brother. Please share your toys." Silence. Gives the tower a push, and brings it down to the floor, his eyes fastened on the television. Barney sings "I love you, you love me. We're a happy family…" his green belly swaying, arms on the shoulders of the grinning children. Sigh and take Di to the bed. Open my shirt to settle him down with milk.

Di asleep. Nipple in his mouth. Hands up in relaxed fists. Quivering eyelashes and pink cheeks. Did my mother ever regret not nursing her four kids? Did she ever feel remorse for giving us to her mother to raise? In her late fifties, she taught herself how to tell fortunes from the Book of Change. When I visited her in Shanghai, she flipped coins every night and read her own fate. She said she was not supposed to have any children. "What about us," I asked with a sullen face. She pointed to the coins. "A total mistake."
Put Di down in the stroller. Squirms. Mouth open. Insert a bottle. Made three vows when my first period flowed: If I die childless, I'll never forgive myself; I'll never hit my children; Never make them pay back what I give. Push the stroller back and forth. Scrawny wrists. Lost weight too fast. There's a reason for mothers to have beefy arms, strong backs, thick waists, round stomachs, strong thighs, and enlarged breasts…

Di sleeping again, a dimple in his cheek.

8:30. The sixth lotus lies between the brows. It sees what the eyes don't want to see.

Sit down to my toast. Wei watches Telytubby in the glider. Ayden bought it when Wei was born. $400. Too much, I complained. "For you and the baby, nothing too expensive," he waved his credit card. "Finally, all is done," Ayden says across the table. I nod, head buzzing from this sudden quietness. Wash the dry bread down with Earl Grey. Grew up with rice gruel and pickles for breakfast. Took ten years in New York to switch to toast and butter. "How come you're not talking?" he asks, glancing up from the newspaper. "I hope you're not going to be depressed." "I'm just tired. Can you tell the difference?" "Calm down," he says. "You should learn how to relax."

Laugh. "You're right. When I have time, I'll work on it. How about saying something nice to cheer me up meanwhile?" He puts down his paper. "Why don't you stay home today? Your cough seems to be getting worse. Perhaps you can take the kids to the hospital. Di feels warm. And Wei seems to have lost some weight."

Hospital. What for? To get more antibiotics? Dr. Wegman is against it anyway unless the infection gets out of control. He said that all fathers should stay home with kids for a week by themselves, to see what it's like. Great idea, I said, laughing. When I get really mad at Ayden, I no longer shout or curse. I just say, "May you be a woman in your next life!" and watch his face turn ashen.

My grandma said a body has thirty-two spirits. They take turns to go out. When they have too much fun and forget to return, the body gets sick. The spirits have to be summoned with songs, wine and food. They fly around intoxicated, get caught in the fluttering strings on a pole carved with dragons and clouds, thus return to the body.

My grandma also told me that I have a body but no soul, that as a woman, I'm just as difficult and unpredictable as children, that I must have done something terrible in my previous life to be born a woman, that I must work very hard to redeem myself in order to change my sex in the next life.

In yoga class, I learn a person has ten bodies, nine of which are hidden, but can be cultivated through practice. Whenever I sit on the floor working on the first body that starts from the rectum, the symbol of the earth, I can't help multiplying each of my yet-to-born bodies with thirty-two spirits. I chuckle as I imagine the day when they return at the same time, three hundred and thirty-two spirits in all, screeching with joy over the fire, spilling wine, scattering rice, messing up the strings and making men very upset.

Ayden wants to know what's so funny. That's a secret, I tell him.

He cleans the crumbs off the table and takes the empty cups to the sink before he takes a shower. Pick up the pink plastic comb from the dresser and loosen my braid. Front hair torn from Di's constant pulling. New hair sticking out upwards and falling over my face. My colleague Eleanor said I looked so windblown when I passed by her office. In old China I might be considered a beauty with a body so fragile that wind could blow it away. Now the fashion approves the body of an athlete, firm-breasted, lean. Once I dated a professor who told me repeatedly I was so lucky that my breasts hadn't dropped for my age. I thanked him and said they didn't drop because they were too small, like lemons, which was a major grievance of my previous lover, who wished I had breasts like pears, if not like watermelons. "Don't ever let them grow into pears or watermelons," said the professor sternly. "They mush your brains, and make you prosy, like my divorced wife after she had a baby."

In the mirror, I look at my haggard face and the milk stains on my shirt. Chinese say a married woman has no shame. Once she has children, she becomes a yellow-faced crone, pulling out her breasts on the streets to nurse. American moms cover their upper bodies and the babies with diapers or nursing blankets. They also have names like mini-van moms, soccer moms. Ayden used to call me Yoga Mom, asking me if I was going to vote for Gore, like all the soccer moms who voted for Clinton, until he busted his stomach from eating four-course meals in Bologna, lunch and dinner, ten days straight. After various Western doctors, chiropractors and acupuncturists, he finally agreed to try yoga.

I squat and pick up the hair around my feet. Every time I pull hair out of the sink, toilet, wheels, I hear mother cursing. I've kept my hair long since first grade. My sister found it really stupid. When we fled from our angry parents, I always got caught because the long braids trailing behind my back made an easy target. But I've kept it since I left home, since my father died and my mother stopped speaking to me.

Wei slides off the glider and shuffles his feet around the carpet imitating Tinkywinky. A priest denounced the show as obscene because he thinks Tinkywinky is gay with his purple body and red handbag. Since then Ayden shouts "Aha!" and asks Wei who this is whenever Tinkywinky appears on the screen. Catch Wei and change his diaper. Wipe his nose. Watch him fall on the carpet kicking his legs up like Tinkywinky. Watch Di fall on top of him grabbing his nose blowing his tummy. Take out the pizza and put it in the lunch bag that keeps it hot, with pretzels and chips.

8:45. The aura dies with the age of mass production.

Ayden walks in smelling of Old Spice. I frown. Bought him odorless deodorant for Hanukah. He tried it for a week and gave up when his father wrote in his annual job review that he needed to eliminate his body odor. "Do I really stink?" he asked from the mirror. "Of course not," I shouted to his back. "When you don't smell of Old Spice that comes from every businessman's armpits, you're saying you're not one of them, you're not his good son." "Come on, don't take it so personal," he said, leaning close to the mirror as he rubbed on the deodorant. I banged the bathroom door behind me.

Let him be, let him be, I tell myself as I fold the blankets, watching him button his stiff white shirt and tan linen pants, his face shining with Old Spice confidence.

"Could you keep an eye on Wei and Di? I need to get ready." Walk into the office converted from the bedroom. We sleep in the living room that's also a kitchen, dining room and playroom. My office has two big windows facing the Mississippi. Walk past the desk to get to the closet. My desk, made of oak, passed through the hands of many school principals. Found it on Canal Street, the edge of Chinatown. When we moved, Ayden's brother offered to buy the desk. But I wouldn't part with it. One of the Indian movers slipped as they took it down the staircase and the desk broke a railing. The landlord jumped out of his apartment and demanded a seven-hundred-dollar compensation. He had been an amiable fellow, always nodding and smiling whenever we complained about clogged toilets or broken handles, and came up to do the repairs immediately. We had never imagined him as a union leader until we saw him on TV leading a group of Chinese sweatshop workers picketing in front of the City Hall. We hadn't seen him much since his wife left for a better job in Hongkong several months ago. He was so angry at the bruised banister, his mouth foaming like a caged crab. We told him we didn't have so much cash on us, which was true, and wrote him a check, knowing with some guilt that it would bounce. But it seemed the only way to get away from Mr. Cheng's wrath at that moment. Much of the furniture arrived with broken legs or damaged drawers. I told Ayden it was our retribution for writing the bad check. He just snorted and walked away. But deep down I think he agreed with me. Only my desk survived with just a few scratches.

The closet is open, clothing and shoes spilling out claiming even more space. Ayden used to plead with me to close things. Always promised but never remembered. He used to get mad. Now he just laughs when he walks in, and immediately shuts drawers, cabinets and closets with exaggerated banging. Sigh as I pick a pair of black velvet jeans and black T-shirt off the hangers. Sober color, if it counts as a color at all, but good for hiding stains. Why can't I keep things closed?

Once at a family gathering, Ayden's kind-hearted Russian cousin turned to me. "Some day you'll be able to buy a house in Edina, the nicest suburb in the area," she said, looking away as I lifted my shirt to nurse Di. "And you'll want to go to the Mall of America to buy yourself a nice dress." I nodded, dazzled by her perfume, her shimmering golden blouse over the purple skirt and silver high heels. "You bet," I said, and sneezed.

From my office I can see tug boats pushing barges on the Mississippi. Used to sit in front of my computer, watching steam run amok over the freezing river and ice crack with hushed roars, wondering what my friends were doing in New York, if the melting snow had already turned the streets into a mud soup. Now spider webs hang in the corners of my filing cabinet. Dust on the manuscript waiting to be proofread. Aching for Beauty. Deadline in two weeks. Stack of writing for Thursday's classes. "My Dad Is a Hero," wrote a student in bold letters. What takes a mother to become a hero? How can I convince people that divinity can be embodied in daily routines, like changing diapers, wiping noses, making meals? Haven't written a word for months. Part of me not living. Di crying from his stroller. Put on socks, hop to Di. Always wanted to have a study. Now I have two, but have no time to sit in either.

8:50. The subtle body. If you're not careful, you can die from your own nightmare.

Di sits up in the stroller, eyes wide open, as if he couldn't believe what he's seeing. Wei trying to dump the dustbin out of the window, but can't get it through the bars. Ayden stomping his feet, threatening to give him a spanking. Lean out of the window. Broom, drum sticks, paint brushes, books and toys scatter here and there on the concrete. This is his new adventure, to throw things from the sixth floor. He once got into my office and flung my Chinese dictionary out of the window. That night a snowstorm came. I spent days looking for my dictionary until I looked down. There it was, half buried in the melting snow on the sidewalk of Kellogg Boulevard. I ran down. The cover had fallen onto the road, crushed by cars. Its body was drenched, but still holding together. Wei brings a chair and wants to see the casualty. Pick him up. "See what you did?" I ask, hoping he's mortified. "I did it. I did it," he shouts triumphantly. "What shall we do?" Ayden asks. "I think a good spanking will make him remember." I shrug my shoulders. "Perhaps. But he'll also remember you hit him. Do you want that?" He throws his hands up in despair. "You're spoiling him." "No, I'm not," I reply. "Just close the window and be patient."

Dress Wei for school. He kicks and rolls on the floor, screaming he wants to stay home today. Was I willful like this? Am I perhaps spoiling him, like Ayden and his relatives think? My mother believes that rods make a filial son. When I moved out to the countryside at fifteen, I took the thin bamboo stick she had used as a whip and hung it on the bedroom wall. I'd look at it and tell myself I'd never be like her. But how many times have I caught my own hand raising over Wei's head?

I squat and hold his little hands, enticing him with his favorite lunch for school-pizza with beef stew. Jumps up and wants to eat it right away. Sit him in my lap and put on the socks. He pulls off one sock when I put on a sneaker for him. Put the sock back and put on the other sneaker. More kicks. His rubber sole breaks the skin of my thumb. "Cut it out," I shout. He freezes and I tie his laces with a double knot. Ayden sits down at the piano with Di. Wei climbs on the bench. They bang on the piano and sing "Row row row your boat…life is a dream." Ayden has a tenor's voice, but is tone deaf. What a pity!

8:56. A thousand thoughts per wink of eye, some of which emotions, some desire, some neurosis, some ecstasy. Our babysitter comes in.

A big smile on her rested face. Takes Di into her arms and consoles Wei weeping over the keyboard saying he wants to sing more. Ayden has returned to his office to put on his tie and suit. I rush to the bathroom. Brush teeth. Rinse face with water. Brush hair in the mirror. Sunken eye sockets, two lines snaking from the nostrils to the mouth, and a Y chiseled deep between the brows. Is it my face, my soul? Where is the temple that shelters the racing thoughts? Oh, this white noise from the fluorescent light, buzzing out of the cathode like the chanting at dawn, the evening prayer of a sleepless child. Pause, hands frozen above the hair, waiting to touch the words flying like ten trillion bees or angels, their dance sweetening the air jammed with desire. No. We never touch words. They touch us, strike the chosen ones with their electric rods, and knock us delirious.

Bang on the door. "It's nine. Let's get going." Just a second, I shout from the sink. Chapstick on cracked lips. "Only good things come from your mouth," a student e-mailed me from New York. Not true. I have choked and bled, with my words, my silence. Ayden's father wanted to know why, with a full time baby-sitter, I had no time for his family reunion. I told him after work, my only desire was to come home to be with the kids. "What if it is emergency? What if you get sick? You're not the only one who has children, you know."

"I don't get sick, and my only emergencies are my children," I wanted to say, but kept silent. Chinese believe that once a word leaves your lips, not the fastest horse can chase it back. "Watch your mouth," mother used to say, whacking my head with chopsticks. "Speak up, girl, speak louder," yell the Americans, wondering why, after all these years in the United States, I'm still so Chinese. They don't know my silence is part of my speech.

Yet he's right about this: how do other mothers do it? How do they do it on their own? Not just one or two, but three, four, seven? Babies are not numbers, but beings that have needs even in their sleep. A mother needs more than ten bodies, one for each of her children, one for her significant other, one for the household, one for the work, and whatever is left goes to her mind and spirit.

9:00. The trust we give to others-this is our radiant body, our grace.

To think how lucky     doing what I'm doing     against all the odds    weep    to think of mother     sisters as mothers      their dreams     severed but never dead     Wei doing peek-a-boo with Ayden     Di laughing     warm     not hungry     get a foothold in this fleeting space     through words     a poet said he writes with his blood     I with my body     ten bodies     to write     in order to remember     to be remembered     our dreams     our humbleness     our sounds

Banging again. Coming, I shout, and open the door to the dim hallway to Wei carrying lunch bag across his chest and Di waving. Kiss the baby good-bye. Di bites nose slams cheeks with his sticky palms shouting Aaaaah his first word that will soon blossom into thousands. Wei leans against his father's thighs. "Who's this?" he shouts, his finger pointing up at Ayden. "It's daddy," he answers his own question. "And who's that?" he points at Di, at the baby-sitter, at himself. Then he comes to me. "Who is this?" he looks up, his hand on my stomach, where the Caesarian keloid stands like a mountain range. "This is Mother!" he announces loudly, before I can answer. We laugh. Arms around father and sons, squeeze.

OK, Ayden says and opens the door.