ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Jasmine An comes from the Midwest. She has also lived in Chiang Mai, Thailand, studying language, urban development and climate change, and blacksmithing. Her chapbook, Naming the No-Name Woman, won the 2015 Two Sylvias Press Chapbook Prize, and her work can be found in HEArt, Stirring: A Literary Collection, Nat. Brut and Waxwing, among others. Currently, she is an editor at Agape Editions and pursuing a PhD in English and Women’s Studies at the University of Michigan.
Guanyin’s Lesson
Mercy is nothing if not kind. Buddha
taught you this, your face cupped in his endless
hands. He holds your cheeks and the bones beneath
his fingertips are the only stable
parts of your body, the rest of you writhes,
changes for each hand that lands on your skin.
You exist to ease pain at any cost.
Your left foot becomes a lighter, knuckles
crumple into empty beer cans, blood curls
away as smoke while an anonymous chat-room
scrolls across your chest. You will keep giving,
Guanyin, because you’ve never learned to stop.
For all his lessons, has Buddha ever taught
you the sound of your own name?
Have you ever called out to yourself then
listened in the silence for an answer?
Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published monthly by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
