lamplight chant

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

So the bloom began to pare the ledgers into three-breath prayers, each entry a small sky pocketed moon emptied river holds a child's name until morning opens its palm origami church bows

It began with a pluck—bloom fingers slyly unpicking the hems of maps until coasts laughed loose Petals spilled like ticket stubs to concerts of weather, flaring into paper boats that hummed addresses The Monkey King winked, batting ledgers into the air; provinces tumbled like marbles, bright and bell-rung Old edicts turned into juggling songs; each unthreaded line learned to skip and call the dusk

Petals paused, picking up a spool—soft thread pulled from the bloom's own light It sewed back coastlines with hush-stitches, each knot a small apology and a hello The Monkey King bent, hands learning the slow grammar of repair; kingdoms hummed like darning Cities folded into palms, mended seams exhaled new street names that smelled of tea and pardon

A seam hiccuped and coughed up a teacup; inside it, a night-market hawked constellations Petals unbuttoned like buttonholes and spilled tiny trains that carried arguments to the moon The Monkey King hummed; stitches sprouted eyes and traded directions for lullabies A corner of the map grew legs and began to pace, treading histories backward into puddles Postmen folded themselves into paper whales,

Postmen folded themselves into paper whales and undulated down avenues like parade floats bearing letters Stalls sprouted from manhole grates—neon tarps hawking moonlit tram schedules and spun-sugar promises Trams looped into carousels; ticket booths became drum circles chanting route numbers into confetti The Monkey King bought a token with a broken decree; the bloom strung street corners into b-

the bloom finished the braid—alleys braided into a single ribbon that kept each corner's name like a promise lanterns took up a hush-liturgy, amber voices counting knots of dark and teaching doors the measure of welcome the Monkey King spent his broken token; trams carried mended quarrels into the moon while paper-whales delivered letters home the map folded itself into the bloom's palm; it closed