False Cognates

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When I learned there was more

than one language, I raised a finger to my tongue

in wonder of what it lacked. When I learned

there was more than one language, my neck warmed

from embarrassment. My parents had kept secrets.

I began to suspect everything of concealing

idiom. Outside, trees would shiver codes

in long shadows. Kitchen knives would glint sequences

when held. A boy understands most what he touches.

I heard cielo and pictured a horse-hair bow on taut strings.

Luz was the verb for all that was and would be taken.

My children have yet to tongue the empty space

in their mouths — that special gap histories fall out of,

their cavities of singing, their cavity singular.