in parentheses

Jaden Fong is a Chinese American writer with a sweet tooth and a soft spot for the whimsical and peculiar. A two time nominee for the Aliki Perroti & Seth Frank Most Promising Young Poet Award, you can see his work on tea-stained paper or contact him through Instagram at @jadenwriter.

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Best Enjoyed By 1/06/2011

it’s a rainy day in Chinatown
and i’m staring at a gutter.
i hear my blood, thick and rich,

as much as i hear the raindrops,
the cantonese, the mandarin
lanterns pushing their lily

bulb bodies against the wet
windows. inside, i see a man,
his white beard scattered

like frayed knots on some ocean
dock. he paints crescents into the raw
meat, car headlights flashing

lightning onto his cleaver. i watch
him only for a second and he pays
neither myself nor the streets

any mind, unlike the gutter
which is roaring some song
at me that i can’t understand.

so i pay it no mind, and watch
my soggy shoelaces streak
across the dry parts of the pavement.

i try to move my shoes in crescents,
pretend I’m doing ballet or street dance—
they’re more like gashes in a cutting board.

i kick drips off the aglets and i look up.
i see the sun seeping through
the clouds like a creeping mold.

god you god

baby i’m a bull in a china shop but
the glasses and silverware and plates
are pillows and sheets and comforters
and my horns god my horns
are getting caught in the linen
and this time i don’t want you
to tear it off this time i want i want
the fabric to smother my eyes until
i choke out some holy thing
that was always deep inside me
according to the preacher this time
i want to feel the glass from that broken shattered
that broken window i want it to slide on my skin
the smooth side and i want the sharp side
to cut you loose and for you to get
the hell out of dodge

I’m Stalling / Lovers Are Cannibals Are Lizards Are Us

It is cruel that the lovers
of the world are composed

of limbs and pieces
of their former beloved.

Cupid shoots scalpels
and it is hardly a fair trade–

a finger for an eye,
an arm for an amygdala.

It is cannibalistic, really.
To eat is to grow and to be

eaten is to love, and a heart
is full of protein to help

some voracious lover
hold the new appendages

up to their aching
mouth. And don’t

you know that lovers
can be lizards? They

can regenerate their lost
tails and regenerate them

and are often stronger–
it will never be identical,

of course, but it may be
knotted and gnarly and

lovely, and you know
what they say about

the unbridled beauty
and travesty of change.

My dear, I must admit
I fear that I do not have the

muscle to hold this hand
of yours much longer.

Telling You About My To Do List

I’ve been cleaning
my knives and forks
under the sink lately.
I do it one by one,
with only a naked
hand and a single
sponge and a zagging
maze of soap spread
across the sponge’s soft
side like butter sleezing
onto some stale bread.

Don’t you understand
that I am just scribbling
in the lines of ripped
notebook paper with
a pen that never runs
out of crimson ink?

Tomorrow,
I will unceremoniously
shove my feet
into a pair
of cowboy boots
and stomp
around
on my carpet, pretending
that it is Dallas
soil.

Could It Be Another Heat Wave?

Through that window, summer couldn’t look
more frigid and brittle. The gelatin heat

bounding off of the concrete is more
like an exhale being filtered through winter’s

teeth, misty waves lapping. Inside on this bed,
light is holding her in a cradle, some holy thing

preserving her in glimmering ice. And just like how
bubbles fossilized in the cold will thaw and leak

into nothing, she will melt; she will slip silently
into everything. But not today. Today, her warmth

is a sick bird in my hands.

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