Kristin Chang

Image by Rachel Sipser

ask me about my immigration status

& ill show u the bucks of my teeth
asians eat every part of the animal

we can always remember hunger
growing into our bodies like bones

1 in 5 people is chinese
& im still alone

& i still pretend my mother didn’t predict my birth
the way a cut predicts the shape of its scar

somewhere is a field of your dead
somewhere is your rebel uncle singing

the lullaby about a girl
who opened her thighs

& all the birds flew out
to peck the stars from the sky

like eyes from a skull, you
have seen your father an eyeless

face on fire
u sat on it

but it kept burning
they say to blame the man

& not his god
but you know

prayer as the fist
in your mother’s mouth

in this country,
when ur body

miscarries its heat & goes up in flames
the men on the street say don’t worry,

they’d still bone you
back

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KRISTIN CHANG lives in NY. Her poetry has been published or is forthcoming in Frontier Poetry, Tinderbox, Teen Vogue, Foundry, Muzzle Magazine, and elsewhere. She is currently on staff at Winter Tangerine and is located at kristinchang.com and on Twitter @KXinming. Her chapbook "PAST LIVES, FUTURE BODIES," is forthcoming from Black Lawrence Press in October 2018.