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leslie-zhang
leslie-zhang
American broke / unstable / loser
tonight: no lemon slice moon, no searchlight of white. a black cradle for black bodies. cylindrical wax, it’s all cyclical – mike brown, eric garner, freddie gray, meagan hockaday – across the street white boy shreds black asphalt, a sloppy chorus of happy birthday spills like their foamy pints over brown tables and black eulogies. those pale faces, those pale fingers, preoccupied more with the bubbling and the stretch of their pizza cheese. look up from your porcelain plates. hear our rage bubbling, see communities stretched translucent. there is blood on your hands and guilt to your name.
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May 9, 2015
May 9, 2015 at 5:35 PM UTC
vigil
nausea pulsating glumness sits swollen in my belly. half-curled on a stained couch, chins bubbling in bed, i listen to elena croon as lovers and friends slip, newborn ghosts in my hippocampus.
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Apr 26, 2015
Apr 26, 2015 at 5:11 AM UTC
spring II
there is something nourishing in cafeteria clam chowder. a deep spice in your belly to fill up the empty feeling one gets curled up to a cold back. rushing home to find an empty, carefully made bed. why fall in love? a new boy means i am writing poetry, again.
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Mar 25, 2015
Mar 25, 2015 at 12:30 AM UTC
spring
i. OVERWHELMED! Reading Philip Whalen's "Sourdough Mountain Lookout" in a Boston cafe' good music good vibes quick approaching afternoon chocolate croissant puffed up in my belly heart puffed up in my chest ready to yell leap skip jump make a ruckus frantic search for pen and notebook of course the notebook is left in Ned's dormitory almost don't have a pen and feel a short fall in my gut. A walking (or sitting) cliche, scratching thoughts onto a napkin as they come, total organic no preservatives except I stopped to think before writing "scratching" -- no! not the word I wanted the correct word is STREAM, STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS, FLOW OF EMOTION - like the beat legendaries whom I idolize but what do I know... generations later, only had ****** (the cool hip term several decades ago) and **** bourbon "Satan's **** that leaves me sick and ***** Good delusion! Couchsurfing across the country, drop by without notice, run broke, read books - poetry & the Autobiography of Malcolm X, living off my parent's hard-earned capitalist cash... ii. Often I fear I am too young and tender to survive in this world. Moments like these - sitting, reading, basking in a cafe - can make me overwhelmed, Got to drop everything and sit, elbows propped, palms cupping numb face, to slow the rush of emotions pulsating thru me. I am too big a fool, fall in love too easily with everything. The boy barista is prettier than I, thought he was a girl when I approached and shocked by his voice. Angel with a black septum ring!
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Oct 1, 2014
Oct 1, 2014 at 12:01 AM UTC
newbury street, boston, 9/26
i. OVERWHELMED! Reading Philip Whalen's "Sourdough Mountain Lookout" in a Boston cafe' good music good vibes quick approaching afternoon chocolate croissant puffed up in my belly heart puffed up in my chest ready to yell leap skip jump make a ruckus frantic search for pen and notebook of course the notebook is left in Ned's dormitory almost don't have a pen and feel a short fall in my gut. A walking (or sitting) cliche, scratching thoughts onto a napkin as they come, total organic no preservatives except I stopped to think before writing "scratching" -- no! not the word I wanted the correct word is STREAM, STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS, FLOW OF EMOTION - like the beat legendaries whom I idolize but what do I know... generations later, only had ****** (the cool hip term several decades ago) and **** bourbon "Satan's **** that leaves me sick and ***** Good delusion! Couchsurfing across the country, drop by without notice, run broke, read books - poetry & the Autobiography of Malcolm X, living off my parent's hard-earned capitalist cash... ii. Often I fear I am too young and tender to survive in this world. Moments like these - sitting, reading, basking in a cafe - can make me overwhelmed, Got to drop everything and sit, elbows propped, palms cupping numb face, to slow the rush of emotions pulsating thru me. I am too big a fool, fall in love too easily with everything. The boy barista is prettier than I, thought he was a girl when I approached and shocked by his voice. Angel with a black septum ring!
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everything crawls everything hums i move slower here déjà vu writing poetry on steps the church doors aren’t locked the church does not exist here i eat alone walk alone sleep alone today my hair was greasy my period didn’t come my sweater didn’t come crawl back towards the lights bury myself into my noose winter will come.
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Aug 23, 2014
Aug 23, 2014 at 5:55 PM UTC
displacement
late night fuzzy mind hooked up like an android to mumbles over pulsating dream pop john maus sing me 2 sleep with ur electropiano i don’t want no new beginnings just wanna park on panoramic way fog up the windows **** in the backseat.. just want july warm wednesdays to drag by forever
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Jul 1, 2014
Jul 1, 2014 at 3:16 AM UTC
tomorrow i go home
she inhales sharp the foliage ***** her in       a diver entering the deep in the pine needles she sees the motions of the universe she is self conscious about her adam’s apple she swishes pasta water around in her mouth google search: how to kiss                          how to behave in a relationship                          how to cure chapped lips … she doesn’t know how to be sentimental, only to take off her shorts and lay still it’d be nice to take the initiative she’s not sad as often now: there is comfort in apathy and burning liquor and the scent of another on the sheets
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May 30, 2014
May 30, 2014 at 2:17 AM UTC
a low key summer thing
new york glasses boy asks questions in auschwitz: were there americans in concentration camps? in krakow: are europeans a race? in budapest: are you okay? why don’t you want people to sing to you? at dinner i hide from the orange rubber cake people try to sing and i try to run after much mulling over a recycled candle i wish for a simple easy adulthood and contemplate flinging myself into the danube.
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Feb 25, 2014
Feb 25, 2014 at 1:00 PM UTC
i am a third wheel reeling thru seven countries
i wonder if he looks back on his life and feels disappointment. this man who calls two strangers his granddaughters, strangers who can’t speak in his tongue and who know nothing about him. not even his name. to us he is ye-ye and not much more. i wonder if i will cry when he dies. ye-ye has heart problems again, my dad tells me. his arteries are too small, the blood can’t get through. i don’t think i will cry but i can sense my dad’s quiet panic. it manifests itself in his voice, the number of phone calls back to china, his google searches on my laptop that appear on my phone. he knows his father’s time is coming, and guilt scratches at my throat because the tears don’t come.
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Dec 14, 2013
Dec 14, 2013 at 12:51 AM UTC
on my grandfather
i can feel the weight of my flesh hanging off of me. i am sick of bloat. i hunger for hunger, a disgusting nostalgia for days of colorless lips and hair out in clumps and shivering in the summertime.
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Nov 3, 2013
Nov 3, 2013 at 12:59 PM UTC
again