Villa 32, Home(town)coming

A seventeen hour trip to hometown was a metamorphosis

I wriggled out to flutter my years of colorful yet deceitful internationality

 

No need for verification. Folks were proud of me coz vanity mattered

We all knew we wanted fantasies, fairy tales, to salivate over and dream upon.

Pampered with indulgent demands

Spoiled with unconditional support

I gradually regressed to a toddler with biological Sugar Mommy and Daddy

They dressed me with that ruffled black gown and ornate choker

 

Stayed at the eleventh floor residence overlooking the extending and entangled urban wilderness

I first sighed and self pitied, feeling like Rapunzel

But I had no voice to attract the Prince nor golden stairs to escape

Where could I go in this city?

 

Even thousand miles away from home New York, confusion and depression still followed and haunted; the past and present intertwined physically but disconnected spiritually

I never realized how unhappy I had always been

 

Wandered around in a different concrete jungle I was possessed with disjointedness

 

A visit to the resort, Villa 32, surprisingly and finally exorcised that loosely figured demon

Soaking in their highly acid spring, named Jade, exfoliated my skin, 

purged my mind

Started to live and breathe the past and present; those things stopped to collide

Under the willow tree by the spring pond a rosy vision emerged from the underneath accompanied by my callus covered toes--

I smiled. 原來我並非不快樂

 

The indiscernible means red transformed into the pasture for peace and creativity

I felt like writing again

 

Hometown could be a getaway, a made shelter

During the metamorphosis return flight, it dawned on me--

我終於可以暢遊異國，放心吃喝

Villa 32 is my Tiffany 

Pink Notebook

In the frames we spoke Mandarin

But someone ourside made English comments

on our every move, things we saw, places we visited

the way we were

 

In a hot summer day we traveled to a tourist spot

You were cranky. I was worried

 

about your motif to dig out my secrets.

I kept all of them in my pink notebook.

 

I tightly held it to my chest while we wandered

to some observatory by cliff; the ocean was below, the mountain light rail nearby

 

Our conversation was mostly trivial, always—

we never really wanted to understand each other

 

No matter how loose our communications could be, you still pried

and at times tried to steal my notebook

 

I was frustrated and angry. I fought back your bullying

But I also wondered why my life still mattered to you

 

The train came and I rushed to it.

I clung at the last car with a leg out dangling

 

You started to chased after the train, cursed me to the hell, but I didn’t give a damn

I was elated

 

Suddenly the pink notebook slipped through my arms

It felt on the rail, rolled to the side, jumped from the cliff, dived in the ocean

 

I panicked. I felt being ripped open

My intestines gyrated in the air

 

I bobbed out of the train, climbed down the cliff, tried to rescue my pink notebook.

Bystanders and passengers were dumbstruck by my action; they gossiped, criticized, and preyed for my ruthless decision

 

I finally crawled to the rocks and I spotted my buoying notebook

It was serenely ensconced in the fluid rocking chair

 

I was happy knowing the book was within the reach

I jumped in and swam toward it

 

The water felt cold yet refreshing

The sun was bright. The air was crisp

 

Yet my pink notebook was gone

 

New Year Resolution

Under the quilt cover
I breathe and ponder--
Plan A/Plan B/Plan C/Plan D/Plan E/Plan F/Plan A/Plan C/Plan X/Plan A…………
Mind races/Panic attacks/Sleep fades

The past is an old dish
I chewed on it, sometimes, if necessary
I know I can spit it out if I want

The future speeds as a rush
I am addicted to such excitement, longing for uncertainty and planning
Whatever is about to happen always tastes better

I know, I am always
insatiable

Urbanite Demonstration

I am an individual.
All my life I am a city dweller and émigré. Cities create, nurture, transform me into who I am. I earn my fair share to speak out my opinions about urban and urbane lifestyles. They are biased, self-righteous, personal, honest and earnest.

My fellow urbanites, I suffer from the reality daily, but I have a dream for someday:

A. We are island souls. We live through everyday as zombies with I-pods and mummies with blackberries. We talk and text through our palm size gadgets. Easily we are connected to our respective universe. Surprisingly we are disconnected from each other.
Someday we will put down whatever we have in hands or at ears. We will smile at each other. We will connect directly through human interactions without any buffer electronics.

B. We make noise like porn stars. We feel entitled to our voice heard. We believe words are the most powerful and accessible weapon to declare who we are and our independence. We get into meaningless verbal fights with strangers. We snort at the idea of actions speak louder than words. We abuse words for the sake of communications.
Someday we will abandon our cynicism and sympathy votes confirming our own existence and independence. We will find peace and quietude.

C. We rush. To work, meetings, dates, coffee shops, restaurants, subway cars, public bathrooms, all kinds of social occasions and venues. We curse when we stumble. We misplace our frustration toward innocent others just because we can't get something or somewhere on time. We hate other people's rush but we rush whoever to demand them do whatever we want.
Someday we will find patience. And we will make efforts. We will realize it's not worthwhile attacking someone when landing on that damn C train.

D. We don't let go. We always remember those who once insult, cheat, and break our hearts. We use hatred and self-pity as Redbull. We mock our parents and siblings who still know nothing about us or even worse, misunderstand our choices for our lives. We feel ridiculous to defend ourselves against anyone with good intentions just because we want to get married with our same sex beloved and plan to adopt children or find surrogates. We are addicted to strangers' physical warmth with a vein hope that a beautiful relationship is developed. We are indeed lonely.
Someday we will realize forget is forgive. And forgive will make our life easier. We will acknowledge and understand our delightful lightness of being

E. We are racists. We are ageists. We are sexists. We are classists. We are superficialists. We have claustrophobia. We have homophobia. We have ghettophobia. We have gentriphobia. We have terrorphobia. We label. We enjoy labeling though it continues to deteriorate our own confusion and contradiction. We try to distinguish ourselves from others to help us find our identity, establish our support system, and feel belonged. But we are still lost, angry, anxious, frightened and we repeat doing the things from the points A to D.
Someday we will recognize human beings are just humans. We embrace each other for who we are. There will be no names and naming.

F. FUCK THOSE SHITS, WE ARE GAY!

Someday there will be no war; we all finally be gay.

Volver

Smoking a Camel Lights calms me

especially with two drags in a row

and take the Solgar Formula VM75 at the same time, for which--

turns my piss into meadow green

You are: about to wallow in the sybaritic splendor

Modern chemicals can be acerbic, for which--
I say goodbye but you say hello
Whoever leaves the party first should dance barefoot

You suck a juicy honeydew hollering sweet

I think it's time to take B-12, Folic Acid 800, and B-1

Your viscera contains syrupy fluid

I am: so ready to fall in the punch drunk love

Leading an ascetic life is half-baked

You say goodbye and I say hello

At Our Feet

I.
In the old days, she would drop something as a hint. Now
She merely glances.
An eye, and it quickly shifts to elsewhere.
(She always observes. With no assumption.)

Someday, somebody will pick up where she drops, and fall down to her feet.
Until then, nobody is paying attention.

They see her. (Of course they do)
She is unique yet common in everyone's eyes.
Eyes, and they quickly shift to other places.

Sometimes she senses their unspoken and indiscernible gazes. They turn into silent attacks. They are everywhere to corner her.
She runs/She dodges/She finds no shelter/She covers her head/She can't catch her breath---
And she blacks out.

In her dark universe, colors speak for themselves. They dazzle her.
Accents fascinate her. Styles puzzle her. Smells nauseate her.

She wonders, is variety really the spice for life?

II.
I am eager, proactive.
I go out to build relationships.
I try to be colorblind and minimum judgmental.
I want to believe sincerity IS the foundation for grandeur establishment.

Difficult. Two eyes rarely see the same thing.

People project me in their own ways. They see me and soon conclude who I am and what I should be.
I just let their imaginations develop, fantasies fly.
I am that light reflected, deflected with a rainbow of colors through their prism lens—
Made in U.S.A, or China, or India, or Turkey, or elsewhere.
The lens are roughly carved,
and I simply black out.

III.
From those stares an intangible tickle ripples her still water.
She feels that sudden wetness.
She is surprised, frightened, and at times disgusted.
She keeps to herself. She secretly analyzes every wisp of sense thread, imposes a scientific research, forces a lab purge.
(Her longing proves her confusion and lost identity)

In her white universe, rules are written as demonstration.
But nobody is paying attention. The connection is vanishing.
She-is-exhausted.
(Lonely? a little bit)

She asks herself: Why do these matter so much?
The Masses Think, Behave, Conform, Succumb to Uniform Value.
She does NOT.

IV.
Some day, somebody will pick up where I drop, and fall down to my feet.
Until then, I have no clue. All I know is--

The eyes will see.
The colors will mix.
We will be happy.

I can hold our hands/I can listen to our whispers/I can touch the softness of our flowers/I can feel our warmth under our sun/I can squint and smile
And I

Public Recommendation

On an A train heading downtown, I was reading Audre Lorde’s essay/manifesto, "Poetry Is Not A Luxury". At the 125 Street station came onboard a young poet looking for listeners, advisors, and penny patrons. I had seen him before; on my way to work, to friends' parties, to the poetry writing workshop. Every time he read different poems, but I hardly remembered any of them.

The poet was a short built African American. He was dressed in baggy clothes and wore a baseball cap. He had long dreadlocks. Seemingly in his early twenties or even younger, he carried an enthusiastic if not aggressive reading style. From a weathered notebook he held close, he rapped the lines with little punctuation. The only times he would stop were when the train scratched the rail to make screeching noise. Or a huge flow of expressionless crowd flooded in and out to cause him struggle to stand still among shoulder pads, briefcases, and fanny packs. Or when he finished.

Between 125th and 59th Street was an express skip, and my focus was mainly on Audre Lorde's. She explained to me that a poet, a Black mother within each of us, would whisper in my dream, "I feel, therefore I can be free". Meanwhile ten seats away, the young black poet exerted tremendous amount of energy to showcase a poem named "Public Recommendation". In my inner auditorium, Audre Lorde was the lead singer on the stage, and the young poet backed up. The performance also featured the jamming from screeching train noise, faceless pushy crowd, and the monotonous preaching of "Stand clear of the closing door please".

As always, I couldn't remember any of the young poet's words. But my ears observed his every move as my eyes locked Audre Lorde's. Although with high pitched voice and intense rhythm, this time he sounded a bit desperate as if he was indeed looking for public recommendation, or recognition. He stopped when he finished the read. He sat down and rested. The space returned to its normally anemic noisiness. As the train approached the 59 Street platform, he got up to walk around for contribution. When he stood in front of me, I was with this Audre Lorde's sentence:"For within living structures defined by profit, by linear power, by institutional dehumanization, our feelings were not meant to survive".

I pulled out of my wallet and offered him a few coins. My immediate or even automatic move reflected my standard reaction to anyone who was worth my contribution in a subway car.
"Any advice?" He asked.
I grimaced and shook my head.
"You are not paying attention, are you?"
Before I could respond, the door behind him opened, he turned around and stumped out against an inflow of power suits.
"Stand clear of the closing door please".

The train started moving as my thought came in shape. I wanted to tell the poet to continue writing and sharing in public. Somebody will pay attention and maybe offer golden advice. But I, confused and distracted, could and can only be his amateur listener and at best a penny patron.

But as I got up to exit the subway car, Audre Lorde whispered to me:
"Poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence".