by Julia Ongking
i am told i resemble my mother.
ah yi traces the mountains
of my cheeks, reminiscent
of grandmother’s bangka sitting
off a bicolano shoreline.
the fortune-teller cups my face,
whispers into kongkong’s
ear. flashes a terse smile
as she pauses at the rounded
tip of a bulbous nose, says
she has never quite seen anything
like it. it is not from your side
of the family, she says, concerned.
it is a problem that i did not inherit
grandmother’s beauty, delicate
like the sprouting bougainvillea
of kongkong’s youth, before
the ugliness of shadowy cities
and scrawling anglican letters
onto colorless flesh. my mother
tells me this story as we stand,
immobile, over kongkong’s
purpled body, consumed
by an insatiable growth
in the liver. she turns away but
we both already know where
the problem really lies. she tells
me, helpless, she can no longer bear
looking my face, for it was not
her fault i look too much like my father.