The alcove of your arm / has become my favorite room / for sleep, but I’ve been roused / by nightmares lately. Even thunderstorms / couldn’t wake you, my mother says / over the phone. I want to tell her / I’ve been seeing a white man, an American / man, but I can already imagine her: / Well, you can have friends. She had never meant / for me to become a Westerner —  / she’s afraid of losing me to a foreigner, being unable to speak / to her future grandchildren. Thousands of miles away / in Korea she asks if anything is wrong. I want to laugh. / Say to you, Isn’t she ridiculous? But / last night a Korean man broke into your room / and raped me, with you calm in your repose / next to me. He sat on my stomach with a knife, / the only gleaming thing. And you were still / in your platinum skin when I opened my eyes. How / can anything be wrong, I comfort my mother.