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The Highest Joy: for Helena Qi Hong
The moment I inject
All my selfhoods
Into your body
My soul dissolves
Into the moisture
Of your love
Like a snowflake
Falling into a hot spring
The Joy of Sexual Love
At last, I’ve become
One and the same
With you as I join
You both in body & in
Spirit, but how come
I cannot hear my
Own heart beats?
What has happened
To my ears? Even
Your laughter is no
Sound, but sweet
Light, while your
Touch is not feel
But a fragrant taste
Just as your smile
Is not look, but a
Bright atmosphere
As all my senses
Start to malfunction
I know I’ve lost
My entire selfhood
Deep in character
As in synesthesia
The Joy of Talking: for Li Lan
We could never stop talking
Just couldn’t really get
Enough of it. Or, to be
More exact, couldn’t
Get enough of each other
As we keep talking about
Everything (or nothing)
As if it were love per se
As if it were more soul-
Melting than having sex
Even after we join each
Other both inside out
Across the Pacific
And the Pandemic
Like two entangled quanta
Inter || Course: the Joy of Reading
Come on baby! Come on
Push hard, just
A bit harder! Push deep
Just a bit deeper! Oh yeah
Oh, yeah! That’s it
All the way into my heart
I have not had
So much joy
For a long time. Oh yeah
How I enjoy it
A total ecstasy! Oh
How I wish to die
Of organism! Yeah
But I am never in love
With a man. Nor have
I ever fucked a half-boy
Except a real reader
Handsome or not
Now I got you right in my grasp
Oh, please, harder & deeper
Reverie
Gushing
Out of his
Frame of
Selfhood
& flowing
Into her
Innermost
Lake
His missing for her
Kept splashing
Along
The wild
Stream
Of last night
Until it
Joins her
At dawn
Like a waterfall
I Writer; Therefore, I Am: The Joy of Writing
How I wished to find meaning in life
Like everyone else, always busy
Trying to make some sense out of
Their small existences. By making
A name. By striking rich. Or by gaining
Power in an office, but alas, they’re all
Ethereal, even if they
Could change the shape of this world
The true meaning of life, if any at all
Is to create one out of it; for instance
By writing and loving. In fact, by
Living & writing about my life, I’m
Living twice & will attain immortality
What I say is, to write is to live
Not only in this moment but to live for ever
As writing offers traceable permanence
Eternalizing & transcending the idea of time
Though the words are subject to editing
Misunderstanding; to accidental deletion
To permanent loss during transmission
As to fire & water, no matter whether they
Are printed in paper or stored in cyberspace
Yuan Changming grew up in an isolated village, started to learn the English alphabet in Shanghai at age 19 and published monoragpohs on translation before leaving China. With a Canadian PhD in English, Yuan edits Poetry Pacific with Allen Yuan in Vancouver. Credits include 12 Pushcart nominations for poetry and 2 for fiction as well as 16 chapbooks and appearances in Best of the Best Canadian Poetry (2008-17), among 2,019 others across 49 countries. A poetry judge for Canada's 44th National Magazine Awards, Yuan began to write and publish fiction in 2022, with his first (hybrid) novel Bamakoola: Paradise Regained forthcoming in 2025.
