On the Highway of Life

      

By Yuan Changming

On the Highway of Life   Sharp curve Slippery Danger Detour Road closed Prepared to stop Construction ahead Yield Yield Yield     Memories, Your Hidden Memories   Are the wine you drank the other day It can never get you Really high, but only make you suffer From another long sleepless night   If the Name Is Not Right   Says Confucius, the speech Will carry no might, or something To this effect, but I do not care Nor will I put up any fight If you call me chink, chinaman Oriental, ching chong, dog-eater Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan Jeremy Lin, Yao Ming, Ling Ling Even Jap or Gook while pulling Your eyes back. Whatever name You call me, my words do not Go right, since English is never My mother tongue, after all     [you vs us]   You cut meat with sharp knives We poke grasses with bamboo sticks               You punch others with hard fists We dance around you with taichi gestures   Your men fuck around everywhere outside your households Our women lay babies right in your living rooms               You colonize every city with an English syntax We decorate each street with Chinese signboards   You deploy aircraft carriers near our waters and coasts We marry girls to your princes and paupers   You enjoy setting fires and blowing winds along our long walls             We have Chinese stomachs to digest all insults and injuries   You try every way to overthrow our government We sell every artifact to help your people survive               You borrow money from us to build more weapons We work hard to make more money for your banks      In the Forest of Life   He kept felling trees One after another   Not to see whose ring is The roundest, but to taste   Which cut offers the finest And most fragrant sawdust     On the Painting Canvas   Wherever his brush pen goes, it Becomes colorful, but even more so Is the blank he leaves un-brushed   Just as the words uttered can be meaningful But much more so are those unuttered Perhaps even un-thought of     Bio: Yuan Changming co-edits Poetry Pacific with Allen Yuan. Writing credits include 16 chapbooks, 12 Pushcart nominations for poetry and 3 for fiction besides appearances in Best of the Best Canadian Poetry (2008-17), BestNewPoemsOnline and 2129 other publications across 51 countries. A poetry judge for Canada's 44th National Magazine Awards, Yuan began writing and publishing fiction in 2022. His debut novel Detaching, 'silver romance' The Tuner and short story collection Flashbacks are all available at Amazon, his duology Edening due out in 2026.