Ting Lin

Intention

All spring I ride the bus thinking about if anything
comes after. Seven years ago along the river. Or four years ago,
peddling through Beijing as the lights & traffic dimmed.
But I pick myself up every morning to nail improbable
futures into my notepad. Won the lottery to become a foreign
registered guest worker. On TV the empire is rejoicing,
the empire is asking: what is hiding in the tall grass?
In my dreams I had answers to all your questions,
even when they were obscene. Someone on social media
is asking: I just got arrested for trying to kill myself,
will this threaten my visa status? My mother named me Listen.
Listen, I wanted to come here, so what does that make me?

Ending

At the end of the flooded corridors
of middle school where you wouldn’t face me
I began a life memorizing your words like piano keys
Boys play 乒乓 wordlessly white balls echoing
through the stadium Their faces disappearing
into bird-chatter or the rain falling in the courtyard
Come watch the past mutating into the past winnowing
into 大厦崩塌 Or the hour chipped away by light
dissolving the silver halide I spent years retracing those steps
What difference does it make? Walking towards you
or walking away

Ting Lin lives in Oakland, California. Her writing has appeared in The Baffler, The Cincinnati Review, and elsewhere.