My Deaf & Mute Childhood Playmate, a Poem

The hardships in growing up, translated…

You’d, Described Your Hometown Using the Drunken Universe

Those Years, the 58-Degrees Sorghum Wines Had, Eaten Away the Heart You’d, Lost

The Lips, the Funny Tones You’d, Talked in, were the Broken Down Characters in Chinese

You Couldn’t Annunciate the Words

Like Walking in the Dense Fog of March, the Words Became, Unfound

You Kept Getting Trapped Inside that Loud, the Abandoned, Sonar

With Ears, Dried up. What Remained Were, the Signs, Combined with the Spoken Unclearly Words

You’d Charaded Toward the World. with Words, Stuck in Your Throat, Your Voice, Hoarse, Slanted

Your Life Started, Taking Shape in the Stutters

You’d, Used the Fists, Big & Small, to Describe How You Feel to the World

Even Used, Alcohol, as an Offering, to the Daily Hardships

You’d, Twisted & Bent & Contorted Your Body into the Unevenly Shaped Holes

You’d, Attempted, to Hide Yourself, inside that Fence of Safety

Like how the Fire Dancers Performed in the Literatures

Pulling Away from Those, Heavy Signs, Attempted, to Find that Shore You can, Rest Your Body on

This is, the South that’s, Rich. With Four Acres of Land

This is, the Island of New Definitions. No Sound of Cannons Firing

You Can Finally, Lose Those, Chains on Those, Darkened Memories now, and Take the Gulps of Drinks

Return, Back to the Spring that’s Been Swallowed and Spat back Up

to the Pages and Pages, of Your own Life

And so, this poet’s childhood was all about war, because the world became, silent for him, and because he grew up in an era when Taiwan was fighting for its independence, that, is why there’s, the symbol of being a deaf and mute childhood friend.