Two Poems in Written Tales Chapbook: Finding Harmony
BOTH WAYS
Some days my hair is straight,
Asian as my slanted eyes.
Most days it curls around my face
like waves of a tropical storm
in the country where I was born,
twirling like the helixes of DNA
that hold the code for how I’m made.
Most days I like men more, some days
I like women--though I equally love
biting into the hardness of one and
the softness of the other,
the way I like my popcorn and brunch
both salty and sweet, crisp
bacon drenched in maple syrup,
caramel crunch and sea salt
keeping my tongue entranced.
Some days my heart almost bursts
full of poetry, other days
my mind soars from stories
data tell me. Some days it’s
technology’s sleek edge
that seduces me, other days
nature’s wild, languorous
curves that mesmerize.
Does it matter in what
shape or texture
strength and beauty come?
My eyes on instinct catch their light
spilling from the same spectrum.
Science, art--two of many ways
I seek and share the truth.
Yin, yang--two of many ways
I learn the taste of love.
The earth is wide, most days
I still can’t say where’s left or right.
Not knowing sides, I get
the panoramic view, this gift--
pulsing universe of wonder
I embrace in its entirety.
ENCOUNTERS
I. [detachment]
Each time, we are strangers on a train
moving in the same direction. Midstream
in the narratives of our lives, we find ourselves
new--no baggage to claim, no one familiar
waiting at either end of the journey. We know
nothing of each other; we are the most intimate of souls.
Foreigners in our own worlds, we become pure story:
I am all that I have wanted to be,
you are everything you have forgotten.
Our separate histories remain, still
where each of us began, the noise
of uncertain futures silenced by this present.
We are weightless as water lilies,
each fleeting moment
clean, forgiving as fresh snow.
II. [attachment]
At dusk, the wild cats pace at the back of their cages—
clouded leopard, fishing cat, caracal, serval.
The tiny, clawed otters scurry out of their pool.
We have wandered past closing this time.
In the darkness, we make our way
carefully, seeking to make out the shape
of long-legged wolves that hunt in tall grass,
the endangered oryx, of which we find no trace.
The red pandas have retired, show’s over for the night.
But the cheetah—! I hold my breath, sharp
between my tongue and my throat. Fastest creature on land,
she lays languid on the grass less than ten feet away.
Her eyes gleam in the shadows, her streaked body lean.
She does not fear our presence, lets us look our fill.
Excited, we speak in hushed voices, determined to capture
this rare proximity. You push your camera closer
to the metal mesh dividing us. I move my lips to warn you,
but I am too late—when the flash goes off, she stares
for one long moment, then slowly walks away, leaving us
a little disappointed but much exhilarated, rooted
in wonder inside our cage.
III. [equilibrium]
This morning, I took a shower in your bathroom.
I took a deep breath and allowed the hot stream
to envelop me. I stood still, suspended in water,
hours slowed by the gravity of rising steam.
This is what it means to be at once heavy and light.
At work, the building outside my window is due south.
As the sun's arc climbs, it peaks over the building
into my window a little higher each day. Light pours
unfiltered into my room. I look forward to spring.
Thank you for teaching me the intricacies
of time and temperature. I am relearning
the spaces of my self. This is how I am emptied.
This is how I am filled.
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