For My Mother: Lincoln


Lincoln’s Poem


For my mother
who taught me to walk with you.

Past the storefronts spilling light onto the street,
A kind of trust I never thought I’d find here.

Tonight, I almost believe
The sidewalks are a gamble. The steamed buns and dumplings
from the after-school corner shop are a gamble.

The way the city embraces me… I don’t yet know how to return.
I can’t say yet—not in this new language, not in words that fit.
Are the dumplings too hot? Does it matter?

We eat them anyway, steam curling into the cold, filling our hands
with something familiar. Something I didn’t expect to miss.
New York feels like the answer to a question I’ve been asking
since we left. Since my mother packed our lives into two suitcases,
telling me it was all for the best.

Here, in the sprawling maze of noise and light,
I tell you how I used to walk home in China—
streets narrow, air thick with dust,
how I knew where every road cracked

But I don’t know the asphalt here. The words different,
the rhythm of the school bell sharp and strange.
My mother never liked to admit how hard it was.
She’d smile as she folded dumplings with her hands—
quick, precise, sealing each one with a flick of her thumb,
as if sealing away everything she never said.
The steam rising, clouding the air between us.

I wonder if she ever found her way back.
If the city would ever feel like home,
or if she’s still standing at the airport gate,
looking over her shoulder for what she left behind.
She says how proud she is—
but her voice cracks
Carrying the weight of years
she can’t get back.

So we walk, dumplings in hand,
steam rising between us
As if we both understand.