SMALL THING

Small Thing

Life fears me with mortality,

making me urge for more ends,

until the last moment of urge I will make

–when I compromise,

it should be illusory, yet I’m not trying to debunk the impermanence of life.

With my closed views of the world,

I isolate myself from the beauty of life I have dreaded to live in.

The terror haunts me.

View yourself; such a temporary thing you are

with an unknown void that would soon disappear

it whispers life’s weight, reminding how I would forget everything I cherished;

Nothing remains; everything is wiped away by time, by sand, by ocean.

The echoes of life the waters ushered blends into the horizon with mine

And where do I find that end to the horizon!

The tighter I hold, try to control, the faster time slips away,

toward the echo of a voice I once knew,

instantly thinning into light

The ocean mocked me with its eternal rhythm and soon

plunged me in its currents

The last breath—it was fragile,

but the world resumed

So I gasped out of the blue and screamed into the wind!

Yet my voice thinned,

dissolving into amorphous matter

What life must take (Y)

I circle around,

yet to face the same quiet stage.

Odor of the mats spring with an odd echo

–it anchors me down with an anvil;

it drowns me;

it pounds me;

only a blur of light above.

The light reflects against the fragmented mirror,

then splits their way across the room,

adding much gravitas in its dense atmosphere.

The drops of sweat–dark and heavy–

engrave on my body.

The blur sharpens; air thickens; and

I grasp them with my calloused hands,

only to see them draining through the gaps while

ink bleeds from my arid hands–

where’s the fresh green?

The carving gets deeper;

fond shades of the ink soak the ground I stand;

I cannot teach what life must give

Glimpse*

Chimes of distant bells echo my heart

–ethereal they were, with the plumose exhale hushed in my ears.

Lavender petals settle down on the brim of my delicate helix,

pollinating the resonants of exquisite fields of life:

Yes, I remember, the tranquil soothings of water–

they slowly enveloped my eyes that braced for their last glimpse of beauty

of silver, celestial ripples

floating immensely across the auroral midnight, and

how I then was too late… too late to grasp it,

with my eyes already liquefied with those wrinkles.

I wondered then,

whether the beauty was ever mine to keep—or was it just too much for an ordinary life,

and maybe I am destined to enjoy the dim world, the duty of dull, repetitive cycles.

Jian Yeo is a student of poetry based in Massachusetts, where the changing seasons and scenic landscapes serve as a constant source of inspiration for her work. She is currently a student, balancing her academic pursuits with her passion for writing.