Only one out of ten people born in a year of the Goat finds happiness (十羊九不全) ~ Chinese folk saying

Some would drown
theirs as soon as they
were born. Luck won’t come

with age, they’d say,
and death in water
proved far easier

than milk. Some would
cut theirs out early
to change the animal

while others would stop
making love all together
and wait for the goat

to pass. Give birth
under the horse, they urged,
in its calla lily mouth

and mane of jasmine,
in brackish yellow heat.
A goat, they said, is raised

for nothing more
than slaughter, an arid field
of withered primrose.

But his heart
is nothing
like the sound

of goat or horse hooves.
Between breathing
and drowning, he listens,

silver and quiet, balanced
on the ribs
like on the ancient frame

of an unbuilt house.