On this morning a crisp, new year unfolds

  golden limbs, face shimmers, and rises to spy

my mother lay out on the clothed table

the reserved statue of our Gold God, blessed

water bowl, aging incense sticks, lighter

instead of matches, and repackaged hope.

Mother starts with her annual preamble

lobbing at us that today is shining

upon our path to new chances. She warns

we must thoroughly rinse yesterday’s muck

from its maw before the new journey. We

cup burning incense sticks that cannot wait

to crumble and then rise as phoenixes

that escape from between our sweaty palms.

We suck in the sweet smoke, which sweeps, wipes,

seeps, swipes deep to clean the hard-to-reach

places inside, from head to soul. We pray

praises to our ancestors. We pay them

our usual well wishes. We mumble

ask for blessings that we do not deserve.

We spill reverence as holy water

on our dense hands, miss the Gold God to

use every drop of what could be for us

in this seeking, in this life. All of this

we euphorically believe will lead us

to the arrival of what we have known

since first breath: we are our own golden gods.

Bless me. Bless you. Satoo, satoo, satoo.