ZHENG Qingyu                                                               (home)




Brush your teeth, wash your face and comb your hair, brush your teeth, wash your face and comb your hair, And Then。
11 min.
2024







I Shouted, Then.


With a voice borrowed from the wind.
Put it in my mouth.
Reciting a perfectly neat antithesis poem.

My weary, drowsy pupils,
The crescent shadow of the moon,
Underneath my faint smile.
I can see:
A few strands of hair hidden in the carpet, and silk on the spider's web,
First bleached wild horse's mane which stains the regimen.

If I retreat ahead of the fire's center.
Giving my useless vocal cords to a tail-wagging dog.
For me to step into.
Pounding.
The moon in the water and the flow of stars. 
And with it a whine, stammering
Mourning crashes into the earth-laden air behind the wheel.

Whenever all sight turns misty.
All ears begin to listen:
Me, a prophetic woman.
Sealed within the booming drumhead,
Spring thunder halted by clouds,
And beneath the mountains, the gleaming copper mines,
A blacksmith’s song hums from the belly.

I shouted, then.
chaste takes all again, 
the limp phallus, the white flag,
Adorn me.
To question a theorem of all creation.
To scorn the self-evident presumptions.
I degenerate upwards, shooting the last flaming cloud down.
No need to be submissive, no need to wear a dainty pair of shoes.

Let me hold my spear-length dagger.
The daylight is too serene for my tip to avoid the wind.                         
Gently tease the tassels from your heart, 
With twisting flesh-colored wrists,
The iron chains bind my eyes to yours,
A thin slice of iron, a judgment on the part of sin on your rootstock.

I shouted, then.
I shouted, then.
I shouted, then.
I shouted, then.