WX Speaks from China Wok
by Wang Ping
Chop chop chop
A chicken under the cleaver
Headless, no feather adorning its breast
The supreme court has spoken
False proof of persecution
No leniency no America no asylum
Go home boy go home
The sea is blue outside the window
The Florida sun shines into my eyes
Swollen like home on the other shore
Where’s home? Where’s Mother
Father? Six years on the run. No voice
Where’s my bitter tear? Only spider
Webs seal the stove, books, door…
Swish swish swish
On the cutting board, flaking scales
Mouth wide open, eyes that won’t close
If the fish can speak, what story would it tell?
If the small people have a voice
What cries would we utter? The bell rings
And rings from the tower. Children laugh
As they circle on the grass. Oh Father Mother
Which basement are you kneeling under the cross?
What psalm throbs from your chapped throats?
In the headless breast, the heart beats, stubborn
Into the swelling waves, a bait of earthworm
I’ve never caught a fish or crab, not even a shrimp
But I keep throwing, woosh, woosh…
Until I reach…Aaaiii Mazu, Goddess of Mercy
Please hear my story, a boy homeless
Since I was sixteen, a boy floating from sea to sea
In the hold of a rusty ship, a boy on hunger strike in jail
A boy crossing the border to seek asylum, a boy
Working seven days a week to pay off the snakehead
$60,000, six years, the boy is becoming a man
Still homeless, still an orphan, still dreaming
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh
The chicken is frying in the wok, the fish
Swimming in the oil. From the wanton waves
Who will see me, Mazu, Flower of the sea?
Who hears me boiling in the sea of anguish
Hope? Who will judge me, a small person
With the same May Flower dream and heart of buffalo
Who made this land, this sea, this America?
This Is How You Cross the Line
Any alien who is physically present in the United States… may apply for asylum—INS § 208
First you gather the paper:
Plane tickets, photos, letters, passports
All fake but for Yuan, Euros, Pounds
Fake certificate, fake license, fake face
Everything about you, even the names
Round them up with care
Tear them, shred them, chew them
Flush the pulp down the toilet
Before the plane touches the ground
You come out clean as blank paper
Belong to no country, no race, man or woman
You’re on your own
Bleached, in the mirror
Listless, no hair grown
On your phantom face that is not
Yours--the fear, the hunger, the thirst
The urge to throw yourself
On the ground and cry Mama
No!
You walk along the thin corridor
Along with the fellow passengers in suits and perfume
Who snore and grind teeth in their dreams
Who rush towards the customs, the baggage claims
To the shadows hovering behind the opaque glass
Bouquets, Homecoming banners, limousines
And you stand in line
You choose a booth with a woman officer
Pudgy, pasty white--a contrast to the young
Starved body that’s not yours
You look around
The girl from Fuzhou, still a skeleton
From the two-week hunger strike in Amsterdam
Has picked an obese man
Her tender ankles curve like talons
Over there, under the neon flickering CITIZENS ONLY
You see the man behind the line—
Poised to jump
Dyed beard, dyed hair
The scar on his temple pulsing red
A lighthouse leading you across
the Indian, the Atlantic, the Nordic Sea
His lion fists kept you safe from snakes
In the holds of a rusty ship
You want to throw yourself at his feet
Uncle Wu, where have you been?
But you freeze, your face a mask
Like his, hers, and others
Whose names you must erase
From your sixteen-year-old heart
Suddenly I’m alone
Before me, no human shield
No bridge behind to flee
To jump or die—STOP
Breathe, slow, deep
Pad pockets one more time
Everything set--no baggage, no name
No memory—only this body
No longer mine, never mine
Having crossed endless borders and seas
For this final sprint
The officer looks up
Eyes shadowed with overnight fatigue
A smile across her face and your knees buckle
In that small second—Mother
Will she be on the other side—the land of plenty?
But up is her finger: NEXT
And you push—a puppet
Pulled by an invisible string
The smile recedes from her eyes
Ripples of shock, fear, alarm
Push
Carrying nothing—everything
Past her booth, her yellow line of authority
Past the guard huffing over, gun in hand
Pushing
—a fetus—
Declaring asylum
from Data Recovery Project
by Heather Fuller
Rascaline
vigilant in the street for broken things
a bitch can have her eye out
dog-bitch in and out of foundering
on alert for what the hand might do
cut you in your sleep bony
old numbchuck nostalgia
she picked it up
was obliged to keep it
puppyhead in the jaw
where a hangman's knot would snap
what you left on the roadside
underwear splint and ya'll
---
we must have wanted the whole package
when Jeb is presidente
this oligarch and me
we are not on good terms
went down on the docket like WhiteHouse.xxx
but went into the papers as lately married
here is where the cat bites the writing hand
the dog demurs in the prospect of begging
the cat wasting for all these mindings countless
warnings eluding human courtesy tune in
to ears tails hackles
in the bandit aggregate the love
of country stepped out on us
thank you for shopping
---
what is it about this place
that kept her here Rascaline
even as she withered
she made a pact not to sleep in dirt
packed her mouth with tumbleweeds
Victorian Firebox
having lived at half impact
cold social body type contamination
do not doubt every fist
has its perfect do not doubt
every eye has its perfect fist
---
the great head is disturbed
someone was gnawed off my country all
the schoolkids asked was to say ‘tis of usted
your donotcall phone is ringing
call center prisoners wake up to promise
of the number yet to answer
no is not about you
press one if you'd like to be contacted again
to register your opinion in the future
the woman voting offguard mistaking
laboratory harvest
legislation voicethrowing
the woman offguard mistaking
body's wellness for wellbeing
the woman offguard mistaking
general population rousted mouth
a pact with harrowing facelift canker gullying
when engineering talking to each other
sweat sewn into stitched a gaping
retrieving needlings
was asked of us
some tendering of lesion constellation
lockstep behind each sanction closure
what you will remember are the fools