The Opposite of Abandonment

Singing Funeral

I’ve avoided opening my throat in fear the dead would rise, walk out of me, leave me emptier after their fleeting, and still get deported back into the abyss they climbed from. I don’t think they hunger me. They want to abandon and find a soft rock to lay their head on, a voice, an empty water jug, a song, the striking pain of a windless and deserted desert or a revolver or drugs or gang affiliations. Instead I hoax them to sit perched, their black wings all slick and crow-like while I drag the weight of Mexican unsung mourning in choir. Now I have someone to blame.

féi hernandez

2022

Closet Space

I know I’m godless when
my thirst converts water into wasps, my country a carpet
I finger for crumbs. A country
my grandmother breeds
dogs instead of daughters because only one can be called
home. I am trained to lose accents,

K-Ming Chang

2019

Lake of the Isles

^{January 2021}

After my grandfather died
I waited for him to arrive
In Minneapolis. Daily
I walked across the water
Wearing my black armband
Sewn from scraps, ears trained for his voice.
Migration teaches death, deprives us
Of the language of the body,

Anni Liu

2022

Poems

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The Opposite of Abandonment

Singing Funeral

Closet Space

Lake of the Isles

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