Wong May (b. 1944)

wongmay.png

SELECTED POEMS

How I Too Hate Subject Matter

When you

Came in

              late

I served a dullish

                       dish

                   with relish

— For starters I didn’t

So much 

As UnCook

                  an egg, did

I? As for afters,

    the set

Has roadside bombs

You won’t raise a “remote” to

          & I

              going

The distance

Picked up

An eight-inch

             Pyrex-dish

At the sink

Scrubbed

               with wirewool 

     the constellation

                of its

Disparate

Baked-in

Bits!

This morning

I’ve barely stepped out

               but 2 pigeons

                    2 grey shoes

Suede

Come my way

         just where

         yesterday a pheasant

In full autumnal glory

Stood

         Solemn as a tome of poetry anthology

Right by the open grate of the flaming thornbush

 

North America

How I miss you

& your poets

             especially in the fall!

 

             Though Time,

My friends,

Has pretty well

             edited you

Down to nothing


        Here before a house & garden

In Dublin

             I read you


I don’t read you

Blown in, my friend

              in the wind

Against the astonished crimson

               of this year’s thorny hedge

               camouflage or no

Dappling scarlet/russet-rum

        to battle fatigue

The still unriffled deck

              of New England “fall colours”

       (“neck-feathers”, do I hear?

Out of which

               a   head

So affectless? —

We needn’t

Know


                         It

Returned

     like a drone to base,

A book to the library.


No matter.

This is just to say.

by Wong May
from Picasso's Tears (2014)

 

BIOGRAPHY >