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Growing with the Seasons
I. Rye in the Countryside
Black bows, streaking winds, the rye
is pleasing to the eye. Beauty strikes me
by the countryside. The air is all but
still. Flies come and go; yet, time
stays at a standstill. I rode my bike across
the countryside; well, I rode on the back
of my grandfather’s moped, bumping up
and down as we traveled through that
patch of gravel road; with dust flying
past my ears; eyes closed, all I could hear
was the veer of electricity and the laughter
of his voice. So, it was yellow. It was summer
in the burdened rurality of China, with
nothing left to lose. Rather, nothing I had
gained was worth losing. I, as a child,
wished for nothing more than the simple
company of my grandparents; a stay so
precious that it made the temporary elongate
its permanence; made my smile authentic.
Yet, it has been more than four years since
I visited the Rye in the Countryside, parted
by the big blue sea. Wistful as I am, a call
away I make everyday, though nothing
could replace reality.
II. Gone Were the Beaches
Summer’s day wake-up; time
is wondrously spent waking up
during these summer months,
where solace soothes the eyes.
O’ those beach days, gone were
they too soon; crowded crowds,
lingering lines—all piled up
about the Boardwalk. Pineapple
bathing suits, smoothies from
vendors you trust at first sight.
Sand beneath one’s feet, rustling
into one’s shoes, entwined within
those fragments of seashells. Black
was it all. Heat radiated through
the sand, flowing deeply beneath
the ground, where autumn had begun
to seep through, channeling a soft
Marshal of Wind, commanding a
sudden start to the early weeks of
September. The weather cools
significantly; nature’s evanescent
summertime magic, now replaced
by a feeble tarp of light, frigid as
it is. O’ the day cools. O’ the
night freezes. By soon, December
strikes one’s lips as chapped, one’s
skin as coarse, one’s eyes as hail.
So, gone were the beaches, buried
beneath the advent of time, advancing
only one way, that is, with the current
of time. North of Sun. South of
Cold. Gone were the beaches that
ol’ Summer’s tale had told.
III. The Way I Live Right Now
Trapped. In a box. Under a ceiling
that’s too old. Above wood that creaks
louder than an owl's screech. Left alone,
above Neo-classical wood, left open
for longer than an hour’s peak, is the
modern typewriter that I use to write
my poems. Sensational. Snow’s onset
seems imminent. Storms a’ raging.
Temperatures dropping. Let me show
you what it’s like outside.
The grass is stiffened by the rigid frost that overlays it.
The swing set that we’ve bought in ‘16 bleeds a tarp of brown.
Motionless, the pines erect themselves as pins in a bowling alley.
Tall. Very tall. Perhaps equalling the length of four buses lain vertically.
Nature’s best features are captured by curiosity—
for how come Queen Mab’s intuition strikes me while
I sleep?—picturing the orchard that I grew up with
waking alongside me in the fields.
Above my eyes. I close my eyes.
I see the pitch-black ceiling above me.
As this eternal rest carries through dawn,
dreams materialize of a friendly return to childhood,
basking in that summertime sunshine that
Mom always promised me at the local park.
Closing my eyes, colors arise. Orange, blue,
green, white, and all of the other mish-mosh colors
that you would find during autumn.
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I wrote this piece as a reflection of my childhood days spent dwelling with my grandparents in some of the most rural parts of China. Really, it was a dramatic change from the city (New York City) lifestyle that I was accustomed to, but I loved every second of it since time was being captaived by the love of my grandparents.