she pulls you in with both her arms

becomes all lips and tongue

you can do nothing

but be pulled

to where you will stay—

she’ll be the one

that leaves.

V.

I had a dream that I was living in a square alcove in front of an elevator.

The elevator itself was broken, permanently open,

but I didn’t want to risk living in a box

that could suddenly lurch closed, then up or down.

There wasn’t much to that space, but it was mine.

In the dream, an Asian American woman, whom I once loved

and therefore always will,

visited me often, and we both wondered if she could love me back.

We kept wondering.

I walked the dream streets and the concrete felt solid enough,

the night’s neon was inviting, the fast food familiar.

No one asked me where I was really from.

VI.

Because my brain

likes to punch down

on my

heart

VII.

Joke that when we are together,

they see a terrorist and a little-dick footbinder

holding hands, and can only imagine

what explosions and negotiations are held hostage between you.

What flag you fly when you kiss.

What borders crossed.

In the end it’s you on a Chinatown bus

going nowhere but away—

no sand, no jungle,

no napalm, no nuke,

smoke from the exhaust like a fizzled fuse.

VIII.

She asks you out to a bar and wants to know

what it feels like to be an Asian man,

invisible, taught to believe in our own unattractiveness.

So you tell her, but then she grabs you by the collar

and yanks you across the table to her lips,

kisses you in front of everyone so hard

the paradigms shift.

It is the best way anyone has ever shut you up.

IX.

The only one who wrote you poems.

Her lips drag on you, roads

you will remember.

You begged. She acquiesces.

You become

one another’s favorite secret,

again and again.

You beg.

She becomes God.

X.

She’s locked you both out of her place.

It’s raining, you’re sitting in her car,

she’s singing to you.

Singing to you.

She closes her eyes to let you know

that this song is loss,

and she smiles

as her voice finds the tributaries

in breath, hitches around the notes—

the drops of rain

wander down the glass

and become rivers wherever they go.

She’ll break your heart, but not

in this moment.

XI.

You’re just not attracted to Asian men?

It’s okay.

I’m not attracted to racism.

XII.

It’s so simple it hurts—

in the dream she wants you.

Gets on a plane, plays Jenga with her schedule,

say yes—

you are worth this good work.

Of course you are grateful; her smile is accurate

to the crease,

even in the haze of your REM.

She looks at you the whole time,

her hand in yours

and she sees everything.

Epilogue.

Disappear into a history

you break your own heart to write.

Therapist 4

A river, wanting to go downhill