Monday 5 August 2013

3 Poems by Changming Yuan

Y


yum-yum, you seem to
have become addicted
to this alphabet, nothing but a plain letter
though it may sometimes get you high
high with your skin-colour
as yellowish as the bank of the Yangtze River
as young as a Yankee heart
while its sound can lead you
to the truth you are seeking, its shape
can grow into a huge yggdrasil
where your soul can perch

cawing towards the setting sun 


Corn


A whole body of teeth
Nothing but teeth

To chew the passing summer

We bite off from you
All the pearl-like memories
Tinged with sunlight

A hard but juicy kiss


Directory of Directions: A Module Poem

North: after the storm
            all dust hung up
            in the crowded air
            with his human face
            frozen into a dot of dust
            and a rising speckle of dust
            melted into his face
            to avoid this cold climate
            of his antarctic dream
            he relocated his naked soul
            at the dawn of summer

South:  like a raindrop
            on a small lotus leaf
            unable to find the spot
            to settle itself down
            in an early autumn shower
            my little canoe drifts around
near the horizon
            beyond the bare bay

Center: deep from the thick forest
            a birds call echoes
            from ring to ring         
            within each tree
hardly perceivable
            before it suddenly
            dies off into the closet
            of a noisy human mind

West:   not unlike a giddy goat
            wandering among the ruins
            of a long lost civilization
            you keep searching
            in the central park
            a way out of the tall weeds
            as nature makes new york
            into a mummy blue

East:    in her beehive-like room
            so small that a yawning stretch
            would readily awaken
the whole apartment building
            she draws a picture on the wall
            of a tremendous tree
            that keeps growing
            until it shoots up

            from the cemented roof    


Bionote

Changming Yuan, 5-time Pushcart nominee and author of Chansons of a Chinaman (2009) and Landscaping (2013), grew up in a remote Chinese village and published several monographs before moving to Canada as an international student. With a PhD in English from the University of Saskatchewan, Changming currently lives and tutors in Vancouver, where he co-publishes Poetry Pacific with Allen Qing Yuan (Poetry submissions welcome at editors.pp@gmail.com). Recently interviewed by PANK,  Changming has poetry appear in Best Canadian Poetry (2009, 2012), BestNewPoemsOnline, Exquisite Corpse, London Magazine, Threepenny Review and more than 700 others across 27 countries. 


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