Bak Kut Teh on Wuyi Shan
‘sex, I mean. Sooner or later,
It’s all just poetry’
— ‘little miss never’, Sarah Stanton
remember how timidly you threw the word out
So casually into a conversation
about laksa
‘because you ___ me so much!’
and then the betrayal.
It happens at all ages but the first
stab sears and then bruises
leaving an ache that can only
laughs when our brain RAM is rewritten
in middle-age.
You said that your ancestral village
was too low lying and that
I came from fertile inland mountains
that grew tea that started opium wars
Yours was coastal, fishermen and merchants
who fled wars for richer lands
and only married their own
I suppose that explains your Hapsburg jaw
My village is now a tobacco plantation
but it doesn’t really matter now.
‘Emily Sun’ lives and works on the unceded lands of the Wadjuk Noongar people (Perth, Western Australia). Her works have been published in various anthologies and journals including
Meanjin, Cordite Poetry Review, APJ, Mascara, and
Growing up Asian in Australia.
Her debut poetry collection
Vociferate 詠 (Fremantle Press) was listed as one of the
Australian Book Review’s Books of the Year in 2021, was Highly Commended in the New South Wales Premier’s Literary Awards, and was shortlisted in the Western Australia Premier’s Book Award in 2022. She is currently pursuing a PhD at the University of Western Australia, where she is working on a historical fiction project. Emily is the co-editor/publisher of
Hello Keanu! A Poetry Anthology (2024).
https://iamemilysun.com/
