The yellow sun
Seems to have shied
Away from my father.
I take one hard look,
Cut
His figure like cardboard,
Paste
Him in the throes
Of the Great Wall,
The seaports of Guangzhou...
It fits him like a glove.
My grandfather
Still thinks it's 1937.
He came here
On a boat
That collapsed
Kissing
Our blueing shoreline.
And I'm not sure if he has
Any memory
Of home but
If so, he seems determined
To live as a straggler.
Forever caught in between
His beloved red-ink
Chinese newspapers
And the fact
That he swears
Quite fluently in Tagalog.
My dad
Always forbade me from cursing.
Rarely did himself.
When he did though,
He'd do it fluently
In Chinese,
His beloved
Local newspaper,
Black and white,
Folded
On his lap.
...sometimes I wonder
If the boat
Truly made it
At all.