The sky in June
rises with horns,
my grandmother’s
about her neck in gold,
and sets with chelae, claws,
pincers, the many names
for mother.
A bull gives birth
to a crab, a crab to a ram,
a ram to the cusp
of scorpion and centaur—
the sky grows full
with parturition.
How many names
for this? The looking up.
The summer stars
and all their distant
meaning. The many
names for mother.
How animal
to fit inside
another
and human
to tear our way
back out.