POEMS
by Victoria Chang
My Mother’s Teeth—died twice, once
in 1965, all pulled out from gum
disease. Once again on August 3, 2015.
The fake teeth sit in a box in the
garage. When she died, I touched
them, smelled them, thought I heard a
whimper. I shoved the teeth into my
mouth. But having two sets of teeth
only made me hungrier. When my
mother died, I saw myself in the mirror,
her words around my mouth like
powder from a donut. Her last words
were in English. She asked for a Sprite.
I wonder whether her last thought was
in Chinese. I wonder what her last
thought was. I used to think that a
dead person’s words die with them.
Now I know that they scatter, looking
for meaning to attach to like a scent.
My mother used to collect orange
blossoms in a small shallow bowl. I
pass the tree each spring. I always
knew that grief was something I could
smell. But I didn’t know that it’s not
actually a noun but a verb. That it
moves.
Optimism—died on August 3, 2015, a
slow death into a pavement. At what
point does a raindrop accept its falling?
The moment the cloud begins to buckle
under it or the moment the ground
pierces it and breaks its shape? In
December, my mother had her helper
prepare a Chinese hotpot feast. My
mother said it would probably be her
last Christmas. I laughed at her. She
yelled at my father all night. I put a fish
ball in my mouth. My optimism
covered the whole ball as if the fish had
never died, had never been gutted and
rolled into a humiliating shape. To
acknowledge death is to acknowledge
that we must take another shape.
Ambition—died on August 3, 2015, a
sudden death. I buried ambition in the
forest, next to distress. They used to
take walks together until ambition
pushed distress off the embankment.
Now, they put a bracelet around my
father’s ankle. The alarm rings when
he gets too close to the door. His
ambitious nature makes him walk to
the door a lot. When the alarm rings,
he gets distressed. He remembers that
he wants to find my house. He thinks
he can find my house. His fingerprints
have long vanished from my house.
Some criminals put their fingers on
electric coils of a stove to erase their
fingerprints. But it only makes them
easier to find. They found my father in
the middle of the road last month, still
like a bulbless lamp, unable to recall its
function, confused like the moon. At
the zoo, a great bald eagle sits in a
small cage because of a missing wing.
Its remaining wing is grief. Above the
eagle, a bird flying is the eagle’s
memory and its prey, the future.
The Bees—268 million years old from
the Philippines, passed away on April
26, 2217 in Nome, Alaska. The
detaching icebergs crushed the bees
who used to fly over conference rooms.
Once I nearly died in a small plane with
a CEO, CFO, and COO during their IPO.
On the ground, the CEO glared at me,
as if I had caused the storm. As if the
yellow lights had come from my mind.
As if the buzzing had come from my
shaking. As if the lightning were a box I
had tripped over. Maybe he was right.
Maybe I had become estranged from a
part of myself that wanted to stay alive.
That wanted them to remain alive. In
the same way I had become estranged
from my mother forever, but not from
her death.
To Age
When the stars hit the
windows now, they turn into
flies. Who knew they would come down?
Fly
What happened to the
eagle that lost its wing and
lived in the small cage,
feral like silence.
We stood there with our futures,
filming with our phones.
I wonder if the bird felt
me replay it on the plane.
Calling Late
The men used to call
at all hours, but what I miss
most are the late-night
talks, ones where I held the phone
so close, it pressed like a gun.
Little Soul
I rode on your back
until your knees broke and now
one mile left, I must toss you.
When the War Is Over
I once saw the deer.
They were all wearing blue scarves.
We have finally finished
killing everything.
We are now looking ahead
but have killed past the future.
Turning
My mother is dead.
The lemons still turn yellow,
the trout still stare emptily,
desire is still free.
We still love many people,
eat peaches as if kissing.
The Lovers
There is a wildfire
starving on top of a lake.
See how the water holds fire
but cannot end it?
We insist on love
when all we want is mercy.
The Gods
The fact that leaves can’t
be put back on trees makes me
think that you do not exist.
On a Clear Day, 1973
On a clear day,
the horses
they had been
fed were left.
across the field
and had
people found them,
they still
people who
hunched over
But the sounds
of their
a clear day, all the
sounds fit
day, all my
thinking fits into
What if our
thinking was
If it only
remains thinking
When out, it
becomes
shapes with
sharp points.
of thinking but all
the thinking
Today, I am hungry
but all the
only 48. On
clear days
48 people,
and 48
And 48
apples.
But no
matter how
6 dead
Asian women who
All night, my
thoughts are
morning, I lean in
closer to the
drawn lines
across my face.
both the
outline and the
not meant
to hold in
disappeared. Just
the apples
The apples
were strewn
become
rectangles. When
gathered and
ate them. The
their apples were
far away.
chewing were
over here. On
into the boxes.
On any clear
boxes that can’t
be opened.
never meant to
come out?
within
boxes?
weapons, takes
on different
Today, there is
no shortage
is divided
into portions.
portions are gone,
there are
there are only
48 birds,
houses. And
48 wars.
I keep counting
grids.
I try, I still
get
don’t fit into
48 boxes.
shaped like
birds. In the
mirror and
someone has
I realize that
failure consists of
outlined. That
lines are
our
emptiness.
On a clear day,
the horses
across the field
and had
people who
hunched over
a clear day, all the
sounds fit
What if our
thinking was
When out, it
becomes
of thinking but all
the thinking
only 48. On
clear days
And 48
apples.
6 dead
Asian women who
morning, I lean in
closer to the
both the
outline and the
disappeared. Just
the apples
become
rectangles. When
their apples were
far away.
into the boxes.
On any clear
never meant to
come out?
weapons, takes
on different
is divided
into portions.
there are only
48 birds,
I keep counting
grids.
don’t fit into
48 boxes.
mirror and
someone has
outlined. That
lines are
they had been
fed were left.
people found them,
they still
But the sounds
of their
day, all my
thinking fits into
If it only
remains thinking
shapes with
sharp points.
Today, I am hungry
but all the
48 people,
and 48
But no
matter how
All night, my
thoughts are
drawn lines
across my face.
not meant
to hold in
The apples
were strewn
gathered and
ate them. The
chewing were
over here. On
boxes that can’t
be opened.
within
boxes?
Today, there is
no shortage
portions are gone,
there are
houses. And
48 wars.
I try, I still
get
shaped like
birds. In the
I realize that
failure consists of
our
emptiness.
With My Back to the World, 1997
This year I turned my back to the world. I let language face
the front. The parting felt like a death. The first person ran away
like a horse. When the first person left, there was no
second or third person as I had originally thought. All that
remained was repetition. And blue things. This year I stopped
shaking the rain off of umbrellas and nothing bad happened.
The terror of this year was emptiness. But I learned that it’s
possible for a sentence to have no words. That the meaning
of a word can exist without the word. That life can still occur
without a mind. That emptiness still swarms without the
world. That it can be disconnected from the wall and still
light up. The best thing about emptiness is if you close your
eyes in a field, you’ll open your eyes in a field.
Friendship, 1963
I came to the city so I could see gold. When I arrived though, the
leaves were gold too and I became confused. I called the front desk
four times and Angel answered each time. By the third call, he ended
with talk soon. In the morning, a different man answered and I burst
into tears. On 53 rd Street, small children kept on running into me. A
father yelled so loudly at the boy on the scooter that I thought he
knew I was carrying death on my back. By the time I arrived at the
museum, there was a long line. The bald man in front of me kept
turning around to look at me. I could tell by his forehead that he
could hurt me. When I finally found the room, I was the only one in
there. Everyone else was below me, in the Picasso room. While I
stared at the gold rectangles, two attendants talked about whether
to work overtime and get paid time-and-a-half. I wanted to tell them
that there’s no such thing as time, just time and a half. Sometime in
the night, Etel Adnan had died. I had just seen her paintings the day
before. The crowds were large and I wondered whether our looking
had accelerated her death. When I took a photo of Agnes’s piece, I
saw my dark reflection on the gold. I started counting the grids but
the bald man came up next to me. Suddenly there were two dark
shadows on the gold. I asked him to step away but when he said, No,
it was Agnes’s voice.
Pear Tree
This squirrel has a dark patch on its face. I doubt that it
is the same squirrel from yesterday. Maybe we’re not
meant to be anything but many people at once. Our
selves at odds with our other selves. On the best day,
their sullen backs to each other. I face the other living
eucalyptus in the backyard. Aware of my back to the
missing tree. I have never once written something
slowly, due to a fear of being corrected by my own
thinking. I know my overwriting has something to do
with the tree and its absence. A new desire to grow
light. What am I if I no longer need my dead parents?
I have lived a thousand lives since then, exterminated
two thousand stones. I now have love all to myself.
When you have love all to yourself, you have so much
of it that it‘s no longer just a premonition of itself.
It starts to mingle. Like Klimt who gave the Pear Tree
to his mistress, Emilie Flöge, but continued to visit
the painting, filling in all the bare spots. So that
what remained was love on top of love and more
pears, all the sunlit pears.
Ode to Joy
Where double-breasted cormorants fly back and
forth. On a highway of lack and joy. Mouths
empty one way, full of dying fish on the way back.
The fish is grief but the bird flying back to the tree
is joy, meaning grief is inside the mouth of joy.
Lately, all I can look at is the dark green covering
the gold. Maybe joy and grief are the same
electric wire. We watched the cormorants go
back and forth all morning. In that moment, my
mouth tasted like dead fish. I thought of how my
father always gave the fish eyeball to an honored
guest. The long dinners, large round tables
where the fish’s eye would stare, glassy and open.
Of how life is a long series of being looked
at and looking. I always thought that being looked
at was the goal. We talked about the
cormorants and the fish. Then the sun came up.
The bird froze in the middle of the sky. Nothing
moved but the fish’s eye in the bird’s mouth.
Some days, gold is inside green. Other days,
green is inside gold. There must be a reason
why we can see all of it at once.
My Mother’s Teeth
Optimism
Ambition
The Bees
To Age
Fly
Calling Late
Little Soul
When the War Is Over
Turning
The Lovers
The Gods
On a Clear Day, 1973
With My Back to the World, 1997
Friendship, 1963
Pear Tree
Ode to Joy