Lethe

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Boarding this one-way train,
where will tomorrow be?
No one bid farewell,
yet our memories linger.
At midnight,
the Milky Way gazes at the Earth;
You appear as a seagull in my dreams.
Those thoughts don’t belong
under this piece of sky.
Moments of joy are fleeting,
while feelings of loss are perpetuated.
I folded my silence into the suitcase,
falling into the cracks of the next city
with friends’ well-wishes in tow.
Twenty-eight inches of silence,
as if you could ever really forget.
After six thousand tries saying goodbye,
I found the courage to not look back.
No wet springs here,
nor red silk cotton trees.
Through the city’s harbour
to the coastline I tread,
The hailstorm of seagulls strikes my heart.
Allow me to unveil new friends
and life’s allure;
A burning eucalyptus,
a magpie that cannot fly,
A group of cicadas in golden silence,
a sea in wild spree,
Red as a sun unwilling to set,
Blue as a stringless kite wandering across the sky.
Yet I am the pest of July,
hollowing out time with my eroded will.
Ambiguous messages come from beyond;
Old news leaves behind grazes that bleed.
Beneath a clear sunset,
seagulls circle,
Yet the departed no longer speak.
Nestling my ears
upon the crack of a seashell,
I hear flowers falling from the trees.
A scrap of blue sky
can’t patch poisoned air.
The crowd persists like ants.
I fall back from winter’s grasp
Into the season where plum rain pitter-patters.
Farewell, plump clouds of the city.
Beneath a clear sunset,
seagulls circle,
Even the living shall forget.
Tomorrow is an unfathomable secret,
Just like an announcer emerging from backstage.
This is a world where it is better to forsake the light,
Embrace the night,
stand by,
And follow the contrails left by flights.
As the question mark
is about to turn into something else,
I yearn to net the Pacific winds for you
On the last typhoon day.
Originally published in Stamped Zine, Volume 1: Limbo (2023). Read the full issue .