VALERIE HSIUNG
Image by Daniel Uncapher
from I did it I said it
-
One person’s opinion
The quiet before noon and then the swell after the noon
Just one question
Where do I put the respirator?
Is there such a thing as next-door of kin?
She put a bounty on her enemy’s name
The nail in the wall that a century ago hung up a family portrait and now will never
be extracted again
Or, the knife she stuck into her breastbone when she believed he no longer loved
her?
-
A woman who never spilled a single drop of food or wine on herself, on her lap, not
once, never, not one, not in an entire lifetime
It didn’t make sense…
Hearing a bed on wooden floors meant you could easily tell when a body moves in
the other room of an old house, dolls
You should take this as a compliment…
I thought you were the woman who doesn’t sleep anyway
When it’s brighter inside with the lights on than it is outside and it’s morning
Means I’ve become a beam of the floor now and the bed you hear shifting’s just the
occasional sigh or a whisper, flames
-
Monday - Stick tongue out and collect (4) drops of (temperate) city rain
Tuesday - Open window because heater’s broken & won’t turn off / need to find
another date to the Full Frontal taping next week because missing and/or dead
sister got a job yay for her / Also I think I have a problem / Is now a good time to
address it? / No
Wednesday - Office day!
Thursday - CREATIVE DAY!!
Friday - Stick tongue out and collect piss (from 4 story walk-up), beer, spit, a/c
water
Saturday - etc / BODY
Sunday - etc / XOXO
-
A statement that changes the course of history
A windowfront in an immigrant enclave that was smashed with knockoff vases
A woman who has hitchhiked blind now for twenty-two years continuously and is
counting
A woman who owns nothing to her name except revenge
A woman who now rises based solely on where it hurt most
An orgasm so loud that, they say, the whole neighborhood could hear and heard
A statement that changes twelve people’s lives forever, and as a result the nesting
spot of a species of bird becomes more exposed to their natural predator than any
other marked magnetic reversal
I know what you can do to me
I know what those things can do to a person
Isn’t that… special
One person’s opinion
The quiet before noon and then the swell after the noon
Just one question
Where do I put the respirator?
Is there such a thing as next-door of kin?
She put a bounty on her enemy’s name
The nail in the wall that a century ago hung up a family portrait and now will never
be extracted again
Or, the knife she stuck into her breastbone when she believed he no longer loved
her?
-
A woman who never spilled a single drop of food or wine on herself, on her lap, not
once, never, not one, not in an entire lifetime
It didn’t make sense…
Hearing a bed on wooden floors meant you could easily tell when a body moves in
the other room of an old house, dolls
You should take this as a compliment…
I thought you were the woman who doesn’t sleep anyway
When it’s brighter inside with the lights on than it is outside and it’s morning
Means I’ve become a beam of the floor now and the bed you hear shifting’s just the
occasional sigh or a whisper, flames
-
Monday - Stick tongue out and collect (4) drops of (temperate) city rain
Tuesday - Open window because heater’s broken & won’t turn off / need to find
another date to the Full Frontal taping next week because missing and/or dead
sister got a job yay for her / Also I think I have a problem / Is now a good time to
address it? / No
Wednesday - Office day!
Thursday - CREATIVE DAY!!
Friday - Stick tongue out and collect piss (from 4 story walk-up), beer, spit, a/c
water
Saturday - etc / BODY
Sunday - etc / XOXO
-
A statement that changes the course of history
A windowfront in an immigrant enclave that was smashed with knockoff vases
A woman who has hitchhiked blind now for twenty-two years continuously and is
counting
A woman who owns nothing to her name except revenge
A woman who now rises based solely on where it hurt most
An orgasm so loud that, they say, the whole neighborhood could hear and heard
A statement that changes twelve people’s lives forever, and as a result the nesting
spot of a species of bird becomes more exposed to their natural predator than any
other marked magnetic reversal
I know what you can do to me
I know what those things can do to a person
Isn’t that… special
Valerie Hsiung is the author of three full-length poetry collections, most recently e f g (Action Books, 2016). Her latest work can be found in Cloud Rodeo, Cosmonauts Avenue, The Fanzine, Flapperhouse, Foundry Journal, Pinwheel, Prelude, Tammy, and Yes Poetry. She has performed at Casa Libre en la Solana, Common Area Maintenance, Leon Gallery, Milk Run, Poetic Research Bureau, Rhizome, and Treefort Music Festival. Born in Ohio, Hsiung studied literature and translation at Brown University, and is currently based out of New York, where she works as a modern-day matchmaker. She serves as an editor for Poor Claudia. Find her online at flowersintheirmouths.com
