Explaining Myself in a Forgotten Language

Dear Ma,

Am I a stranger now?

Or has the stranger always been me?

We come from the same roots,

Yet I feel like a leaf about to detach,

Floating on a breeze you don't recognize.

Desire is not a sin—

After years of loving in a silence

That even words cannot penetrate,

I find myself sitting alone

At the foot of your bed,

Staring at the idols of gods you pray to.

Your hands, laden with years and prayers,

Fold into devotion for gods

Who never had to come out.

I whisper love in a tongue you've always known,

Yet today, it sounds foreign to you.

Do my confessions make you falter

In a language we used to share?

Dear Ma,

I still am the son

Whose first steps you cheered,

Whose scraped knees you healed.

I still need your love

In a language I haven't forgotten.

Are you willing to speak it,

Or have we lost our mother tongue?