In the Party (revised)
星期二 九月 15, 2009 9:36 am
Here we shade under the early autumn’s leaves,
click our glasses and cheer.
Wasps circle lower around golden pancakes;
columns of grasses cling to ground with a sudden wind.
Along the newly-painted fence, various flowers bloom.
Angel’s Trumpets climb tall in the late afternoon.
I recall their Morning Glory name from my hometown -
where they light up my misty village.
My tongue slips into the hidden memory;
the dry wine, sour and naked,
bites my shallow throat.
Listening to the rising voice
in telling one’s own immigrant story,
I am sunk in a love arm chair,
mute as a straw crow.
I pour a glass of cherry wine,
and swallow the sweet;
the images of
my father’s sad eyes,
my mother’s crossed fingers
loom.
They kept the past within themselves,
I was granted an intact silence.
Frost grows heavy from my silence,
tomatoes in the backyard are ready to fall.