Predicate
I remember my dad telling me That, when he was a kid he told himself, "The girl I'm going to marry Is somewhere out there in the world right now Living her life, and we're both just waiting For the day our lives intersect."
Mom laughed. "How did you know she had already been born? You could have fallen in love with A much younger woman."
My dad is a couple years older than my mom. He repeated two grades. He says, He was waiting for her.
(I remember I used to cry when my parents fought Because I didn't yet know the only people worth fighting with Are the ones you care about, and the trick is figuring out How to do it and still love each other afterwards)
Was my father always this confident? Was my mother always this patient? I wonder how much they've changed Each other, grown together, What they would have been without each other.
My father grew up in Kowloon. My mother rarely left the island. How strange to finally meet Speaking Cantonese in Canada…
I'm sitting alone in my room as I write this, singing to myself under my breath, inhaling softly while thinking about the shape of my mouth. A mouth is functional because it is empty, it produces meaning out of absence. A mouth speaks for the stomach, it speaks for the lungs. A mouth that is full is useless until what it holds is either swallowed or spoken. It’s why I enjoy going to the dentist, and why some people fear it. It’s a strangely intimate moment. Your dentist knows more about the inside of your mouth and the contours of your teeth than anyone else in the world, maybe even yourself.
It's probably for the best if I never meet the love of my life, Because my greatest talent is disappointment. The only thing left to know is whether I'll be disappointed, or if they will.
When I'm afraid enough to feel sick, My hair falls out, an auto-immune reminder Of my mind in disarray. Someday, I'll have no hair, Just like the present king of France, Or the person whose heart flutters When they hear the sound of my voice.