thepoetslizard
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Karma: 0 |  | Anna Li Sian
« Thread Started on Oct 10, 2008, 3:56pm » | |
Anna Sian, a Filipina American born and raised in the East Village, NYC, majored in psychology at Dartmouth College in NH. She grew up under the mentorship of poets such as Beau Sia and Ishle Park at the Asian American Writers Workshop in NY and gets her inspiration from the New York poetry scene; the Nuyorican Poet's Cafe, Bowery Poetry Club and Urbana at CBGB are her second, third, and fourth homes, and not necessarily in that order. Anna won second place in a citywide poetry contest for the Bertelsmann Foundation in 2003 and competed at UC Berkeley with the 2004 Dartmouth team for the National College Unions Poetry Slam. She thrives off Hip Hop and mangoes, and loves to write about love.
"spring giants"
I would hand over Hanover
in a New York heartbeat.
The ba-boom boom beats faster
where sidewalk strangers brush
shoulders like ghost magnets
and rush past, they post questions
like como te llamas and
where's the fire on cotton shirts,
as the domino effect of
unintentional taps sends blasts of
electromagnetic zaps.
Here, I’m April's fool
cursing flower buds
for starting over
‘cuz we warmed each other as winter lovers
naked trees, like our naked knees
kissed each other as bitter winter winds
swept through their limbs
in your last days with me,
we kept low profiles like
color-changing reptiles
chameleons drinking chamomile
and belly crawling at bedtime,
taking turns turning into one another
and icicles that dangled off roof shingles
like dripping glass snow cones
and frozen noses that tingled
like post-punch knucklebones
justified our staying home alone
now,
the rain cries for me
and mud grabs my heels
like it never wants me to leave.
feet grieve over bootprints
like miniature graves,
depressions in dirt,
prevention of rebirth as
desperate blades of grass are slashed
as i pass.
my ankles bask in mud baths,
as spring springs up faster than
the pangs of a natural disaster,
and like a rocket ship blast that ripped past
you zoomed off and left me
with some lonely-ass whiplash.
Hanover winds leave heavy handprints
on black-penciled eyelids,
though fresher than the prince
northern winds sting more
than the world's strongest breath mints
i wince when they blow like oboes
like tiny Pacquiao blows to the nose
my lungs would be happier
if we were breathing the same air.
(i crave the unwavering nature
of warm southern vapors
infused with subtle spice flavors and
thin-crusted empanada whiffs to savor
as they hang and hover over your shoulders
like wounded soldiers)
i beat dirty gravel until it thins out
into fine concrete.
i grind earthworm carcasses
with rainboots until they resemble
subway gum stains.
i thread stars into a necklace
until it stretches out to form the
Williamsburg Bridge's night lights.
I am an ant in the great outdoors
who wishes to be the giant
on the fortieth floor—
she who reigns by windowsills,
crushes SUVs in their
asphalt rivers with one thumb and
laughs at rooftop sunbathers
for thinking the sun is theirs alone.
From below,
we would be two dancing shadows of giants
that bounce on the twos and fours
and float from window to window.
*
"the pinay speaks of rivers"
I’ve known rivers:
I’ve known rivers of memory that drip drop
drip drop like the music of my childhood
water flows through me in the form of ancient icons of hip hop
like the Fugees and MJ
I have bathed in the sounds of famous voices
echoing off of a tired, rusty radio
doing the eight-year old “running man” through static
like it’s part of the effect because music
sends messages to my spine and bends it into crooked lines
I’ve seen rivers
that move swiftly like my slender fingers, nimble hands
gracing the baby grand piano delicately
as if it was the new pair of Nike’s I was scared to crease
rivers of inspiration and introspection
whose currents travel from my head to my pen
the drip drop of ink as it takes the form of my soul
and captures life like tadpoles
in written words on looseleaf
I’ve known rivers
more ancient than the long misplaced smiles
replaced by lines of age on faces of fathers,
these traces of trauma each emulate the Nile
all the while, the drip drop drip drip continues
like rain on rice plantations
where weary men bend and break their backs in the sun
in order to feed their young
men like these fill up Filipino family trees like Autumn leaves
that each has his time to fall
I swam in the Yellow River
until it dyed my skin as a reminder
at times I carry this color like a cross
rather than advertising it proudly on highway billboards
I am neither dark asphalt nor white lines of paint
I dance in the middle as the yellow-dotted misfit
but yellow does not define me
I am defined by a double set of historical players
not only JFK and Uncle Sam but also Jose Rizal and Carlos Bulosan
I am defined by the drip drip swooshhh
of crimson rivers, tinted by the blazing blood
of hundreds of thousands of life-givers, my ancestors
I am defined by ripe mangoes, unbearable heat and indigenous drumbeats
I’ve known rivers
I’ve known rivers more beautiful than a mother’s heart
warmer than Jasmine tea, fuller than the lips that whisper
stories of my past late at night
while I curl up like an insect
her sunken eyes like shipwrecks
tears drip drip
drip drop…trickles of salty water baptize my body.
I’ve known rivers
Passionate, powerful rivers that carry pieces of my life on their shoulders
and will soon pass through me when I get older
onto my unborn children and theirs
my heart has grown full like the rivers.
*
"lost history"
I’m rehashing flashbacks like blast from the past
of solemn songs sung by my sisters
Muslim gongs rung under
Reversed skies, rehearsed by
the warmth of backwards winters
no blizzards, just geckos and sticky lizards
floating like feathers
remember December in sticky weather?
Do you remember the time?
I remember, even when high school history class
textbooks bypass a people, condense a culture into a line or two about
the Philippine-American war and even then, emphasize “American”
there’s no room in the classroom for
stories of rebellion, re-colonization labeled as “liberation”
losing lives in someone else’s war for false promises of freedom
stealing resources and selling it back for twice the price
no, students be consumed by the fumes of apathy
made pretty by the biased disseminators of the nation’s information
what’s the 411 hun?
For one, I’ll leave your cerebral a little less feeble
for one, I bear too heavy a conscience
the conscious are few
with consciousness lies truth
truth lies in a gutter run over by lies,
misconceptions and stereotypes
by “go home, immigrant,” doused with diatribes
and subtle ignorance like “what areyou?”
What am I?
What the fuck are you talking about?
I’ll teach you a little lesson your school curriculum left out.
I am not your pretty little hello kitty ching chang china doll
with Chun Li buns and karate kicks
I don’t rock school girl outfits or model for import cars
I don’t avoid eye contact, or giggle with a pitch that only dogs
can hear
I don’t pose with peace signs for sticker booth pictures
I don’t get my hair straightened when it’s already straight
Or dye it red to black to red and back until I forget
the hue my ancestors knew
I am a product of plump mangoes and dirt roads
water buffalos and Spanish clothes
funny accents and flip flops
reconfigured to mingle with
New York City hip hop
I am a product of words you’ve never heard of
And I’m not here to preach it the mic
I am just a poet who perceived a little light
But they only see me as non-white
And they cloned my face and posted it on pages of pornos
asking “is your pussy slanted too?”
and I became a fake creation of male imagination
an Asian flower to be devoured, who begs to give head
a pasty-faced geisha in a skimpy kimono who’ll bone ‘ya
and call you master in bed
They say “how you doin’ China Doll, cmon baby, wassup, you
don’t speak English?”
I speak English better than you do, motherfucker, and how’s THIS for China
Doll cuteness?
Sticks and stones may break my bones but sometimes
The wrong words can hurt in places
Sticks and stones
Can’t
Reach
today I am the lone poet on the six train
clutching my repressed retorts in a closed fist
and spitting them out like confetti onto thirsty paper
my dreams may be deferred but they are still unyielding
I rub these wounds in hopes of healing
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