GAIL TIRONE
Taipei Nights
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Mist in the small alleys
like white veils covering the dirt
whiffs of sweet tofu broth
steaming and white
and tofu vendors
pounding the paths between
low brick walls
their calls in the night
like the pathos of tofu
spread thinly on brick
City dwellers
a bamboo flute cries unexpectedly
from an open window
like a swan stifling in pollution
heavy incense wafts from a miniature temple
and in the shadows someone mourns
the day – lost
profit – lost
a lover – lost
This, the city of loss
of disappearances
where friends meet in groups
treating each other to meals
toasting always toasting
with shaoshing rice wine
the amber liquid of polite conversation
obligations like chopsticks
useful and abundant
and the serving girl
clicks her chopsticks
cutting yard-long noodles
friendships like noodles
long but cut
with a violent clack of the chopsticks
The city of disappearances
where plum blossoms
fall over the garden wall
into the gutter
and dissolve like watercolors
city of disappearances
where art is wrapped up
like so many little dragon dumplings
and promptly devoured by schoolboys
city of buses
to anywhere
buses full of rain-stained windows
like veils and white tofu
blurring the loss
of the friends and the swans
the blossoms and art
City of resigned women
taught from childhood
how to obey and endure
and anyway too tired
at the end of the day
to mourn.
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