She Had Some Dragons

Joy Harjo wrote about horses; I chose to write about dragons, one of the many mythical creatures us Asian people get to represent us, for better or worse, right. 

SHE HAD SOME DRAGONS
after Joy Harjo's, "She Had Some Horses"

She had some dragons.

She had dragons who were clenched tree trunks.
She had dragons who were smoke ghosts.
She had dragons who were palm rocks, stacked into wishes.
She had dragons with wave tumbled skin.
She had dragons with desperate teeth and bit their daughters.

She had some dragons.

She had dragons who swallowed swords because they liked the taste.
She had dragons who hunted the ground for quarters.
She had dragons who reached through the fog to touch her.
She had dragons who flew backwards into the sun, who could not look at their mothers.
She had dragons who ate other dragons
for breakfast.

She had some dragons.

She had dragons who made love in a math equation.
She had dragons who made love in a corolla.
She had dragons who made love in an earthquake, in a falling building, in a corner someone told her was safe.
She had dragons who disappeared under pressure.
She had dragons who found adventure in books, who raised their hand only to turn pages, who kissed like heroes.

She had some dragons. 

She had dragons who woke up to a war, who cut the steel springs from their mattress and planted a field of bullets for their children.
She had dragons who moved rice grains with only their chopsticks, stacked them into mountains. 
She had dragons who climbed these mountains, with bricks on their back to build a village at the peak. 
She had dragons who thought they died alone.

She had some dragons.

She had dragons who broke into barbed wire gardens.
She had dragons with cold blood, who could wrap around her in a hurricane, turn the temperature of her hope.
She had dragons with warm blood, who knocked at her door with black eyes and cut knuckles, fire spitting from their wounds, and it burnt to touch them, to heal them, to rock them, to love them,
but she was not afraid.

She had some dragons.

She had dragons who made language their tank, who held a room captive.
She had dragons with stone eye replacements.
She had dragons who blew kisses into the dark to torch the way.
She had dragons who missed her.
She had dragons who did not know her.

She had some dragons.

She had some dragons with winged backs.
She had some dragons with lead hearts.

These were the same dragons.