stone epitaph

A wild flower flickered in the Monkey King's palm—small as proof, loud as a crown He taught it tricks of wind and riddle-speech, to cart the dusk and tumble kingdoms down Its petals rewrote maps: veins as poems, each fold a compass that makes old borders frown So from that stubborn bloom a new legend grew, stitching history to song and earning its own renown

At dusk the Monkey King cupped the bloom like lantern-light for vanished vows, Each petal exhaled a roster of ruins, names folded into the hush of boughs, It remembers our names, soft as ash, murmured into the river's slow mouth, Farms unlatched their memories; the moon stitched back the silhouettes of towns, It remembers our names, a reed-song passing under bridges and through crowns, The flower—

He pressed a petal to granite; its filigree learned the patience of chisels, Syllables sank like pebbles into the ledgers of rock, rain polishing each name into claim, Hamlets gathered around carved lines, reading the bloom's verdict as both law and altar, Where petals became inscription, the river taught itself to spell them with its current.