in absentia
Previously published in Synaesthesia Magazine
truth is i (probably) loved you
but only in the way of burned silk
& crumpled paper cranes. only like
i taught myself every jeweled facet
of ruin first. this is what i always do.
i never learned how to praise a thing
without calling it perfect. this garden
is a corpse & beautiful with it, every bird’s
song a death knell. a funeral dirge.
i didn’t cry till we left the cemetery
& even then it was only for how
the dry rose petals undid themselves
into the wind. how the words
picked the gravel from their palms &
exhaled into sunday, then monday,
& sunday again until the forgetting.
all these different types of dreaming
mercury rises, an acrobat pinned in glass. slits the air
with its borrowed swallowed swords, parches the roots
to magic powders. blows age off
the leaves silken in your fingers
until they too bow down to the unmaking. you
would never survive a high-wire act
like this.
you, the mirror, wondering if images can speak
of violence. you, the mirror, voiceless with dust
pooling in the hollows of your knees. rainbow-hued
in the sway of oil, the heat heavy
as roadside lifetime or rockslide aftermath. with ankles
rolling over the uneven steps
out your reflection-crafted house,
ligaments stretched like saltwater taffy. too soft to break
or bite through. not so for the ocean’s arms; they
are shattered glass
on the seashore, the only waves
that escaped the carnage no more
than bursts of broiling air, savage
in their solitude. give it time.
all this deep & dehydrated blue
will turn to a stone-frozen thing, the weight
that transforms this season circular & cyclical,
deathless & deadly.
tobermory
Previously published in teething season for new skin (L’Éphémère Review, 2018)
this is a blood-sickness // inherited weakness // the grotto up north
was ringed in teeth // but they did nothing // to stop the cliff divers
so i scraped my palms // in underground caves // with the little girl
who rug-burns her elbows // on the bedroom floor // we shared for years
her hair spun so fine // that it halo-shocks // out of her wispy bangs
and braids | her canines // jagged as icebergs // around the missing incisors
i’m hoping // all that seafoam-white // doesn’t go to waste | hoping
someone’s fool enough // to shipwreck on that mouth // hoping she
picks her teeth clean // with the splinters // i gave my oldest name
to a siren-child and she // wears it well | her eyes // already dark as cavity
her soul thrumming // with shark-sense // and every known flavour
of monstrosity | as how // poltergeists have a habit // of nesting in cold sores
or how the grave-socket // of the excised tooth // now plays home
to a ghoul | siren-child’s // blood matches the cold // melody of ours
she sleeps under the glint // of a cabochon-cut wave // and wants to know
if you too are yearning // for that home | wants to say // come home
Quinn Lui is a Chinese-Canadian student and writer with a fondness for bees and soft fabrics. They are the author of the micro-chapbook teething season for new skin (L’Éphémère Review, 2018) and, currently, an Associate Editor for Acta Victoriana. Their work has been published or is forthcoming in Luna Luna, Occulum, Half Mystic, and others. You can find them @flowercryptid on Tumblr, Twitter, and Instagram.
