Charm
Sokna talks about the difference
between Vietnamese
and Khmer: “Vietnamese is
angry:—always
shouting.”
She doesn’t think she should be
called-out for saying so.
She’s only describing voices
other sixteen-year-olds
pitch above the factory nightshift
roar.
She thinks the student teacher
might not understand.
He’s looking at the knotted
scarf she wears from a world
she can’t forget
and might not want to
see again. Does her touching it
betray a modesty verging
on chastity, does it
remind her where it’s from?
Recycling New Yorkers
I almost let my subscription lapse
then nine eleven came
and even if the words had to be
drawn through pipes
too low to make out
and full enough of fog to sock us in
I needed the come one
come all of it.
I had to show my support.
On Monday I imagined
I was too wide awake
to stand on the sidelines
or go to the bathroom
out of earshot of the news.
Trains cut through the swamp
in summer sounding
close enough to
touch—and I thought
I’d purge my restless urges
biking down the side
of a Mexican pyramid.
At first I was scared and dizzy
but I liked how
the path held itself aloof from the hills
while at the same time
blending in with them
which must’ve distracted me
from the difficulty
because without the slightest effort
or clue as to how I was
staying on, I was staying on.
Gerald Yelle’s books include The Holyoke Diaries and Mark My Word and the New World Order. He has an e-chapbook at Yavaneka Press: Industries Built on Words and a chapbook No Place I Would Rather Be from Finishing Line Press. FutureCycle Press will publish Dreaming Alone and with Others in 2023. He is a member of the Florence, MA Poets Society where he co-edits their journal, Silkworm.