The goddess on the moon isn't real but the story still get passed on. Your mother said Pearl was her favourite name when you asked, then two decades later when you asked her again she says she doesn’t remember. All this time you took her words to heart, thought about her dumplings every time you walked by the fancy jewelry store, caught yourself staring at the rounded edge of your Mac mini on the corner of your desk. There is no one out there but the stars burn bright and lovely. Pearl farming was once a science experiment, and you were once a dream.

Next to the mall for old people, a cacophony of youth. Spring break, fresh puddles, a bed of cotton candy. The smell of waffle cone and rubber boots, the garish plastic tarp that can't hide car fumes from the parking lot. You are holding someone’s hand, their face is vague. An obnoxiously loud alarm sounds. You jerk awake, the candy apple has been bitten. Your fingers open like a jellyfish releasing its prey, a reflex you learned by now and a memory of a memory escapes; an echo.

Sparkling kitchen soaked with Lysol, kettle boiling and milk bread in the toaster. Leave the butter out, it stayed too long in the fridge. Crumbs rainbowed, ran circles around you while you manifested success and financial security, and now the orange is a mandarin. You don’t cut them the same way your grandma did. You don’t cut them at all. Pulp drips from your fingers. There’s always a carrot dangling on a daisy chain. 

Crop circles on fields that go on and on, concentric circles inside greater circles. One day going back far enough the blue stopped and there was no longer a word for it. It was all one swath of land and sky on which flowers and birds owned their peace. Then, you had no preference for either when asked what you wanted to come back as. Both were great options. Thousands of years forward far enough and you’ve forgotten that stretch of time. You buy compression socks and a travel pillow and lie down for a nap on a long haul flight to Tokyo. In the middle of the flight you catch a glimpse of the northern lights, it haunts with its beauty, reminds you that you haven’t lived quite like a flower has but you will die like it does and what a pity. A few hours ago the sky said soon, a few hours later it will say it again and one of these times you finally hear it.