At the grade eight dance, they find you
hiding behind folded lunch tables,
seize your hands and feet, drag you
across the floor like a mop.
On the dance floor, a girl
feigns stomping on your face.
You run to … more »
Have you ever had those dreams
you know, those carbon-dark
sorts of dreams?
Where monsters and men made
of the same fabric move in
and out of each other, amorphic?
I’ve had; those sorts of dreams.
those lamp-black,
sorts of … more »
Our new L-shaped house embraced
a pool as its heart, a curving
figure eight, turquoise shimmer
mirroring turquoise clapboard.
My father’s pristine pride
May through September. He’d
skim off leaves, vacuum sediment,
push the long-poled brush along the bottom
back … more »
I wrote one
million poems
not one featured
the word brown.
I scalpeled my own pulsing heart
excised all trace of spice or silk
routes
stepped politely away
from ugly temptation,
sari-clad white women dislocating
pinocchial hips
Every poem I … more »
There are clouds on the move to
the end of their edges, close
to the end of their own shapes.
Frayed where nothing was ever
woven, they unravel what no one wears.
Despite their large size,
they’re too light to … more »
I would paint my skin
Into a colorless color, & I would dye my hair
Wear two blue contacts, & I would even
Go for plastic surgery, but if I really do
I assure you, I will not remove my … more »
Homes that have held me
made me dream, and left me,
worlds that birth me –
squeeze me,
out violently
Before I got the chance to ask,
can I stay a little longer?
non-oriented
now; broken
open – dispersed
There … more »
At Qingming Festival
True, it can never grow
Like a real seed, but
My father’s bone ash is
So well planted there
In the rich soil of his
Native village, it has kept us
Hoping & hoping
For just another … more »
There is a jungle
With lime coloured vines
And trees
That wear their bark
The way that Green Mambas
Wear their skin.
I follow the sound of anklet bells
Deeper and deeper
Into this green
Praying
For just a glimpse… more »
Patriarchy
How is a daughter
named? My mother pleads
to the librarian tapping
dewey decimals for the Hanja dictionary;*
a weary oracle of bastards, retards
and girls. Perhaps she pulls
my eyelids; probing
for floaters, films,
blemishes, basic faults… more »
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