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

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.

He pressed a petal to the lintel; its script slipped down like a held breath and shut its mouth, Villages learned to count by that quiet, marking years in a single, careful exhalation, Promises cooled to a stone's patience, edges softened by the slow grammar of moss and rain, Centuries moved like reverent callers, touching each carved name and leaving it to sleep deep in the hill.

Moss folded into the carved names like a choir settling into hymn, threads of green humming low, Its fronds counted each syllable, slow as prayer beads, secreting moist consonants onto stone, Villagers came at dawn to read the verdant verses, stroking letters until the town remembered how to speak, Even the Monkey King listened, letting the bloom and the hill administer the quiet sacraments.

He pressed the blossom into furrow; its scent taught the soil how to pray Roots took the bloom's vowels, winding names into loam like quiet litany Every buried syllable became a slow lament that fed the living underground Villagers bent low and heard their ancestors grow, a mourning that would not decay

They rose in a slow circle, palms cupped like pots, and took up the answering chant Elders struck spades like drums; each thud unknotted a name and let it fall as seed Children hummed the blossom's litany, teaching kernels to pronounce the vowels of the dead Earth closed on both lament and harvest; graves braided with granaries, and the Monkey King bowed, washed by the town's quiet tears

They sang the town to sleep, each name swung like a lantern on the slow breath of dusk, The Monkey King laid the bloom to rest, petals folding like palms over the day's small grief, From furrow to lintel a cradle-song circled, repeating its soft measure until the hills echoed it, So every name settled, lulled by that patient returning music—again, and the valley closed its mouth.