i WOULD HAVE HATED MYSELF FOR NOT CALLING OR WRITING YOU MORE OFTEN WHEN I SEE THE SAINT AT THE GATE.
|
But I didn’t die that time.
I promised to call & write You more often & I did. In the end, when I saw The Saint at the Gate, I didn’t hate myself. I’d kept my promise. The Gate was small & Wooden, faintly familiar. You remember. It was A duplicate, I believe. There was no one else Under the archway Of leaves. I cried When I saw her. Stranger With a plaintiff’s face Who couldn’t erase The letters I wrote, The phones that rang, The years I spent waiting For you to answer. It began with the Saint Seeing me see this. |
|
I HAVE TRIED MY BEST AND THEIR IS A LIMIT TO MY PATIENCE.
Their was. Words
People once used
To describe us:
Their family,
Their drama,
Their yellow house
Was. He tried us. His best
Was better than ours.
Our best was trying,
Convicted of lowliness.
The loneliness of being
Criminalized on a daily basis.
No docket for that life.
Just his letters in my pocket.
Justice. His rage delimited.
Now, in our time of need,
His patience could feed China.
Miraculous loaves, fishes
Without limit, I eat them
& then I make more.
People once used
To describe us:
Their family,
Their drama,
Their yellow house
Was. He tried us. His best
Was better than ours.
Our best was trying,
Convicted of lowliness.
The loneliness of being
Criminalized on a daily basis.
No docket for that life.
Just his letters in my pocket.
Justice. His rage delimited.
Now, in our time of need,
His patience could feed China.
Miraculous loaves, fishes
Without limit, I eat them
& then I make more.
Jennifer Tseng is an award-winning poet and fiction writer. The poems in this issue come from her manuscript Not so dear Jenny and were made with her Chinese father’s English letters. Her most recent book is a collection of very short stories, The Passion of Woo & Isolde. She teaches year-round for the Fine Arts Work Center’s online writing program, 24PearlSt. Visit her website at: http://jennifertseng.weebly.com/.
Ben Giles is a multi-disciplinary artist who lives in Norwich, England. He was born in Bury St. Edmunds and studied in Kingston. Nature, metamorphosis, light, colour, collage, collaboration, juxtaposition, repetition, excitement, evolution, manipulation, music, television, improvisation, participation, and seduction are all components of his practice. Find out more at: http://benlewisgiles.format.com/.