lullaby refrain

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

The bloom began to inventory the impossible: receipts for storms, a ledger of vanished streets and small apologies It listed a moon with pockets, a compass that read which childhood you'd be tomorrow, a church spattered in origami birds Rivers were filed under "waiting," mountains cataloged by the taste of their shadows, borders stamped with lullaby signatures The Monkey King watched the list sign

The bloom tucked a giggle into the margins, folding receipts into paper frogs that hopped names like marbles, They croaked corrections—"Turn here, the horizon is on holiday"—and ribboned the borders with jaunty asides, The Monkey King snapped back, assigning mountains to improvise and rivers to practice slapstick by moonlight, Ledger and monarch became a call-and-answer: one lists the impossible,;

The Monkey King unstrung his laughter; his palms opened to a hush that settled like ash, The bloom folded its brightest petal inward, a small benediction for the streets it once remade, Paper frogs, mid-hop, softened into paper boats and drifted toward the margins of moonlight and memory, Ink began to list kinder particulars: names forgiven, the exact angle of a goodbye, the bloom learning to grie

ve—then a crooked grin threaded through its folds like sun finding a seam, Paper boats that had learned mercy now practiced cartwheels, capsizing to spill giggles onto the tide, The Monkey King pinched a cloud and taught it a rumor of nonsense; maps began mislabeling treasure as errands, Forgiveness inked a sly comma and winked; the ledger snorted and sent prank-postcards scattering down the allee

Postcards sprouted brass bells and took to the gutters, tooting receipts into a marigold sky, Alleys answered with tap-routines; lamplighters juggled shadows while cobblestones stamped time, Paper frogs ballooned into marching bands and detonated politely into confetti rain, Maps began misplacing whole neighborhoods into pockets of laughter, folding streets like accordions, The bloom hiccupped a t

The bloom hiccupped a tune into the midnight seam, a cradle-song unspooling like ribboned moonlight Postcards folded their bell-sleep and the gutters learned to answer in two small syllables—soft now Paper boats rocked and named their captains in the same easy cadence: soft now, soft now The Monkey King laid the ledger over his knees and the city softened under his palm; soft now