Poems

Find and share the perfect poems.

Breath for Metal

This a story
I’ve kept in soft
orange inside
my steel body. I’ve wanted

to wait until I’ve
cooled to hum, until
my touch wouldn’t burn.

I’ve practiced to gentle

not to be odd. To remember
me a calm line transmitting not artificial

sugar smile melts a rainy spring I do not want
to feel a tug you wait again for what’s
dissolved into scent for this week.

Ching-In Chen is the author of recombinant (Kelsey Street Press, 2017) and The Heart’s Traffic (Arktoi/Red Hen Press, 2009). A Callaloo, Kundiman, and Lambda Fellow, they have been awarded residencies and fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center, the Millay Colony for the Arts, the Norman Mailer Center, the Vermont Studio Center, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, among others.

Themes

About this Poem

“This poem was written as part of a daily practice to consider the breath amidst and against a time of fear and anxiety when our rights and humanity are being denied in many forms. While shut in during the pandemic, I began a practice of breathing as much as possible while sending my words out into the world. I return to the breath in the struggle to feel more spaciousness within my body, to remind myself to stay flexible yet steadfast in the present moment, to unfurl and stretch into whatever the day may bring.”
—Ching-In Chen

Sign up for Poem-a-Day

More by this poet

Inside me, a family

^{“To walk in the world is to find oneself in a body without papers, not a citizen of anything but breath.”
—Kazim Ali, Silver Road}

born from small
waters. Each night,
I look for paper
to feed this first litter
from a slow continent.

Ching-In Chen

2021

South in Hundreds

Missing one hundred.

Ching-In Chen

2020

Self-Portrait, New City Replicant

To heat a sister           	          House a burn

           adjust the replica body
                      in the yesterday travel rain

no sister locks the door 	at the highest temperature
three hours still parked 	still comfortable to eat  	sugar by force

only because each house keeps a burn together
       	   drinks the page            	An unseasoned tree
chosen to go to the sea

Ching-In Chen

2017

Poems

Page submenu block

Breath for Metal

More by this poet

Newsletter Sign Up