monday poem #111: Nellie Wong, "Day of the Dead"
I chose this one because of the season, but I could have chosen "Voice" (beautiful), "We Can Always" (painful), "Loose Women, You Say?" (scathing), "Drums, Gongs" (bitter), "From a Heart of Rice Straw" (tender)...
Day of the Dead
I open the door in my mask.
"What is that lady?" a little goblin asks.
And I might say I am surviving
the ghosts of myself.
And I might say I have only begun
to wear this suit of armor, my hair
aflame, my eyes blazing
beyond the bodies
of my unknown ancestors.
I fly a kite of a centipede,
flap its million legs,
land on the wings of a golden phoenix
calling me to a land
of hills and birds,
calling me beyond
my childhood fears.
And if I worship the dead,
it is because
I hear my parents whispering
through the marrow of my bones
asking to be fed.
- Nellie Wong
from Dreams in Harrison Railroad Park
Day of the Dead
I open the door in my mask.
"What is that lady?" a little goblin asks.
And I might say I am surviving
the ghosts of myself.
And I might say I have only begun
to wear this suit of armor, my hair
aflame, my eyes blazing
beyond the bodies
of my unknown ancestors.
I fly a kite of a centipede,
flap its million legs,
land on the wings of a golden phoenix
calling me to a land
of hills and birds,
calling me beyond
my childhood fears.
And if I worship the dead,
it is because
I hear my parents whispering
through the marrow of my bones
asking to be fed.
- Nellie Wong
from Dreams in Harrison Railroad Park