A journal of art + literature engaging with nature, culture, the environment & ecology

Two poems by Wutong Rain

Wutong Rain, Beijing-USA-UK

 

It is the season to open your palms

 

It is the season to open your palms. All of the palms

in fine fibrils and veins, to show that you exist

for the bumble bees that are always in a hurry, and each raindrop that is as heavy. 

No breeze is so gentle, so you are bent 

by your own murmurs and joy, while arms raised 

like all the other shyest flowers, hiding their desires 

to be ravaged—

And the season is suddenly brimmed with angst, 

shadows red in large blooms, gushing forth

petal after petal, unheeded 

as no huddle will last

no flower is hesitant to let go 

in full force

like all the other frail things

relieved, triumphant, as crumbled.  

Moon Song

There are women shouting down the alley, loud and clear like full moons.  Soon 

the wind comes and the voices scattered. “Moon-moon, come into my room 

whenever you please!” I beg and they say, “Just a moment, I will be with you 

all night.” 

 

I wait and wait at the windowpane. They pedal 

trailing the sleeps they stole. By dawn 

it is a smeared pastel white, the wind smoothing 

the last ruffles. The full moons have dissolved 

into the sky, each seagull a crescent reminiscing what’s left 

of the one colossal memory. 

 

For the days to come, the clouds imitate 

the moons, the sun may have kidnapped 

the moons, it rumours that 

a moon is a blue balloon indistinguishable 

from the sky, and the sky an empty socket 

of the blind. 

 

If I say loud enough—Moon!—the moon will probably hear. The women 

down the alley complain, “Look, there is no need to be loud. The moons hear 

anyway. They see everything—even if you are not speaking, the moons know.” 

 

Behind me are stars, or Mars

“You are not as big and bright as the moons, but you know 

you are beautiful too, right?” 

“They are much bigger and brighter than the moons!” 

The women chuckle. I blink 

my primitive eyes. Next to me a lamppost 

raining spider webs, a glorious moon 

to the moths, right across the thin glass

so close you can touch. 

 

Moon! Moon! I am spun

round and round and I shout 

down the alley, loud and clear. 

 

Wutong Rain grew up in Beijing, moved to the USA for education, and is currently residing in the UK. She loves to write and is passionate about seeking ways to express herself, including piano and photography. Her works have appeared in The Banyan Review and The Tiger Moth Review. She is a nominee for the Pushcart Prize 2021.

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