Content Warnings (click to reveal)
Discussed: Alcohol
Waiting
you smell rain in the air again,
wet, moldless, exasperating. moonlight
pours & punctures the grey
whetstone. it’s almost real because
you see fishing boats cradled by
the propagating wave, paved inviting
like paddle stones in a flickering,
shimmering light, spells homecoming
across the sea. it’s almost real because
you hear laughter in the rain, dry,
distant, deteriorating.
shattering of beer bottles to the beat.
you reach for that vinyl from your
eccentric records, the player
screeches electrical, vile & to no avail.
pain is a quickly growing collection,
screams only you would listen. it’s almost real
because
you walked the same paths lovers
would, holding hands & matching
attires. necks curving towards
each other, equivocate by maths
equations, an unorthodox paradox.
no one taught you how to solve for x.
you arch your arm & it almost feels
real that you have someone to lean
into because …
because only smoke and sulphur came out of clouds
since twenty-five years ago, when you were born;
because when the city-fringing, street-cornering,
dimly lit, dream split, bleach-paint, window-barred
room went out, so did human civilisation,
withered like windflowers on a whim
while you sank alone in darkness, never turning
past the first page of your Patti
Smith & sullied that song
not with your throat,
but throat-slitting gin
unspoken silence is a sin;
because paralysis precipitates pain
in stop-motion pictures.
yet here you are
in your wrinkly raincoat,
tapping your feet, whistling
homecoming,
writing while waiting for me
to show up.
King Gnu
running.
i was running,
pre-birth, pre-breathe, pre-breeze
when we were wildebeests, wandering
in the wilderness of Masai Mara,
grazing on the razed pasture.
we stood shoulder to shoulder, horns to tails.
i was a calf, less than half of their size,
stifling next to mom who shared my shiver.
i didn’t know when some whispered, "we are at war."
others mention the prophet’s premonition. a vision
of a pasture, greener. a shelter, more forgiving.
i didn’t understand either, but i kept moving
mom pressed her head against mine
“run, so your tongue could taste the rain
in the wind.”
i’m younger,
shielded by brothers and sisters, we march,
like mangrove fruits through the mud,
pain endured in those hoofs,
like fear imbued in the roots.
glimpse of elephants ambling on;
what if i slow down?
within the herd, i heard the crisp,
creaky lullaby. it makes me restless,
as sleepless as this endless July.
i can never have enough questions
for this migration: i want to know
how far i can go
before my flesh sunder, bones shutter;
the ground tremors beneath the stampede,
closer to the limit my beating heart stops
to bleed;
until i get lost in me
what if i stop?
galloping
time is a collapsing cliff that looms
a crippling shadow, vertiginous
near vertical. i’m willing to trade
my clatter for cadence,
prudence for a purpose,
my life for a licence to stay.
now, the herd gathered by the riverine,
seeking collective courage, knowing
crossing calls for collateral damage;
passages paved over the carcasses
render my escape a chance
no time to glance or grieve the goners,
what dies, survives.
i want to make it a promise.
Joachim Li (he/they) is a Chinese Australian poet and fiction writer based in Gadigal Country (Sydney), passionate about exploring themes of identity, interpersonal connections, and environmental angst. Joachim founded the creative storytelling podcast “licensed poetics” and is a finalist at the 2023 National Youth Poetry Slam. They have performed their work at the State Library of New South Wales, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and others. He is an editorial reader for Frontier Poetry. They are also working towards a poetry collection themed on healing and transformation filled with striking imagery, incidental rhythm, and aural qualities. He can be found on instagram at instagram.com/youare_him
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