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| Notes | 105 |
The New copy of this book will include any supplemental materials advertised. Please check the title of the book to determine if it should include any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.
The Used, Rental and eBook copies of this book are not guaranteed to include any supplemental materials. Typically, only the book itself is included. This is true even if the title states it includes any access cards, study guides, lab manuals, CDs, etc.
Chapter One
Blues on Yellow
The canary died in the gold mine, her dreams got lost in the sieve.
The canary died in the gold mine, her dreams got lost in the sieve.
Her husband the crow killed under the railroad, the spokes bath shorn his wings.
Something's cookin' in Chin's kitchen, ten thousand yellow-bellied sapsuckers
baked in a pie.
Something's cookin' in Chin's kitchen, ten thousand yellow-bellied sapsuckers
baked in a pie.
Something's cookin in Chin's kitchen, die die yellow bird, die die.
O crack an egg on the griddle, yellow will ooze into white.
O crack an egg on the griddle, yellow will ooze into white.
Run, run, sweet little Puritan, yellow will ooze into white.
If you cut my yellow wrists, I'll teach my yellow toes to write.
If you cut my yellow wrists, I'll teach my yellow toes to write.
If you cut my yellow fists, I'll teach my yellow feet to fight.
Do not be afraid to perish, my mother, Buddha's compassion is nigh.
Do not he afraid to perish, my mother, our boat will sail tonight.
Your babies will reach the promised land, the stars will be their guide.
I am so mellow yellow, mellow yellow, Buddha sings in my veins.
I am so mellow yellow, mellow yellow, Buddha sings in my veins.
O take me to the land of the unreborn, there's no life on earth without pain.
That Half Is Almost Gone
That half is almost gone,
the Chinese half,
the fair side of a peach,
darkened by the knife of time,
fades like a cruel sun.
In my thirtieth year
I wrote a letter to my mother.
I had forgotten the character
for "love." I remember vaguely
the radical "heart."
The ancestors won't fail to remind you
the vital and vestigial organs
where the emotions come from.
But the rest is fading.
A slash dissects in midair,
ai, ai, ai, ai,
more of a cry than a sigh
(and no help from the phoneticist).
You are a Chinese!
My mother was adamant.
You are a Chinese?
My mother less convinced.
Are you not Chinese?
My mother now accepting.
As a cataract clouds her vision,
and her third daughter marries
a Protestant West Virginian
who is "very handsome and very kind"
The mystery is still unsolved--
the landscape looms
over man. And the gaffer-hatted fishmonger--
sings to his cormorant.
And the maiden behind the curtain
is somebody's courtesan.
Or, merely Rose Wong's aging daughter
Pondering the blue void.
You are a Chinese--said my mother
who once walked the fields of her dead--
Today, on the 36th anniversary of my birth,
I have problems now
even with the salutation.
The Colonial Language Is English
Heaven manifests its duality
My consciousness on earth is twofold
My parents speak with two tongues
My mother's tongue is Toisan
My father's tongue is Cantonese
The colonial language is English
I and thou, she and thee
My mother is of two minds
The village and the family
My mother loves me, I am certain
She moulded my happiness in her womb
My mother loves my brother, certainly
His death was not an enigma
Yet, it, too, had its mystery
I had willed it in my heart
I had condemned him in his crib
When I touched his round, Buddha face
Drank in his soft, infant beauty
Cain and Abel had a sister
Her name is Tiny Pearl
Too precious to be included in their story
Her small throat trilled in vain
The Tao of which we speak is not the eternal Tao
The name that we utter is not the eternal name
My mother is me, my father is thee
As we drown in the seepage of Sutter Mill
Take a Left at the Waters of Samsara
There is a bog of sacred water
Behind a hedgerow of wild madder
Near the grave of my good mother
Tin cans blossom there
The rust shimmers like amber
A diorama of green gnats
Ecstatic in their veil dance
A nation of frogs regale
Swell-throated, bass-toned
One belts and rages, the others follow
They fuck blissfully
Trapped in their cycle
Of rebirth, transient love
Unprepared for higher ground
And I, my mother's aging girl
Myopic, goat-footed
Got snagged on an unmarked trail
The road diverged; I took
The one less traveled
Blah, blah
I sit at her grave for hours
A slow drizzle purifies my flesh
I still yearn for her womb
And can't detach
I chant new poems, my best fascicle
Stupid pupil, the truth
Is an oxymoron and exact
Eternity can't be proven to the dead
What is the void but motherlessness?
The song bellies up
The sun taketh
The rain ceases to bless
Copyright © 2002 Marilyn Chin. All rights reserved.
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