How I Learned About Starlight

There was a tradition in my village
That was believed to be as old as time 
We gathered and watched lanterns as they lifted off to the sky 
Mimicking starlight, they became wishes of my people 
Lifting up then burning out with the flames itself
My mother wrote her wishes on leaves hoping they'd surpass the stars 
She wished that they'd go somewhere even farther
To a world, stories of which strangers had told her
But to no one else did that world live
It was an imaginary land for our people somewhere too far to exist 
But my mother painted it before my eyes and into my shaking hands 
It lived between my ribs, and on the height of shoulders
As I learned the meaning of Mercury from her 
Of its red, its shape and it's ever burning fire
She also told me stories of Jupiter 
She told me of its large being and shape, 
Making me promise never to shrink away 
Never to cut out part of me to fit into places I don't belong 
But the moon was what she talked of the most 
The one deprived of light
The one that lived in the shadows of the sun
And only in that shadows did it burn
So did my mother somehow
In her were lanterns brighter than what had ever touched the sky
She was the sun itself.
And I burned and learned under her of a world far from that
The one which I knew of
Where there were four walls not stars
A broken ceiling fan to make up for many moons
That had been long gone
The one that I had to get away from
She would sing to me
Just as she wished her mother sang to her,
Told her stories of the sky and the sea
Told her that it was completely alright to just be.