Archive > Vol. 21 no. 2

Yu Yoyo

Translated from the Chinese by May Huang 

Tongue

The tongue is not yet independent
So I sit and wait,

Wait for it to gain consciousness, to revolt
Wait for the water gurgling in my mouth
To turn into an ungrammatical sound

That anticipates being heard
But gets swallowed up 

The tongue is damp, lazy
And opaque
Whether it can differentiate the truth is unknown

So I too fail to differentiate 
War broadcasts through the air
But the dead make no sound

Tyranny in a petri dish 
Feelings interchange
Germs proliferate  
All we need is a tongue to complete the experiment

Ever since there was violence 
There have been footsteps pacing back and forth
Wearing clothes is a prison sentence, and stripping
To one's skin and bones is a prison within a prison

Ever since abusers discovered the tongue
The universe gained another useless thing
To flog, brand, and dismember

Why not stir-fry it
And feed it to the starving

Eating another human isn't so hard
Our intestines flow with 
Corrosive sulfuric acid 

How many disasters have we digested
Let's digest another "why?"

The tongue grows stiffer and stiffer
Trapped inside mouth and spectacle
As it deteriorates into fossil 
Borrowing the shade of amber
And the cowardice of insects