Dorothy Chan
Ode for Baby Pandas, Hong Kong Mornings, and My Grandmother
The one English word my grandmother knows is beautiful--
Beautiful, like pandas knocking over buckets of leaves
in Sichuan, over and over again, and their nanny moves them
to a corner, their adoring fans waiting with cameras,
and if I won a million dollars, I’d fly across the ocean
in a heartbeat just to hug them, just to give them cardboard
to rip, just to see them trot along on their merry way,
ready to cause more destruction, ready to knock over
more buckets of leaves, and it’s beautiful, and speaking of cute,
I’d take a date with baby pandas over a date
with the celebrity dreamboat of my fantasies any day,
even if said date included a view of Tokyo Tower
and raw oysters and every caviar imaginable and the best lobster
in the world and a nice serving of uni and a little Cioppino
and pistachio gelato and some French fries with sweet ketchup
on the side, and Do you want to go out for a steak
later? I’d like it nice and rare, nice and rare, and that’s everything
I want, but I want the pandas more, and it’s beautiful
the way the panda expert on television declares that pandas
are beautiful because they remind us of our own children,
and I’m jealous of travel show hosts who get to cuddle them,
because I think about their black and white goodness,
like black and white cookies or Little Debbie Chocolate Cupcakes
with their oh so twee vanilla spirals, reminding me
of cute girls wearing cute blouses with black ribbons,
and I’m not pure enough to pull that off, but I appreciate
the effort, ladies—beautiful—and what about blackout cake
or white truffles or my favorite Hong Kong drink of all time,
the yuenyeung, the yin yang, the divine East Asian morning
concoction of three parts coffee and seven parts milk tea,
and it’s eight, not seven that’s the lucky number in Chinese
culture, but that’s beside the point, because this drink is
beautiful, beautiful with a Hong Kong breakfast of noodles
and ham in broth or what about condensed milk on toast,
a side of Asian sausage, or what about plain and simple
congee—what a beautiful morning, and oh, my grandmother’s
so beautiful, and it’s beautiful how beautiful is the only word
she knows in the English language, and I love how she loves
girls wearing double buns because they remind her of pandas
and I think it’s beautiful how the Scottish Fold next door
makes her smile like she’s a kid again, and she wants
to let him in, but I’m allergic, but oh that smile—beautiful,
like my first memory with her, making cookies in the shape
of camels, and if I won a million dollars,
I’d fly across the ocean, take my grandmother with me
to play with pandas in Sichuan, order her a bowl of noodles
with lots of beef and tripe, and oh, do you see those baby pandas
knocking over those buckets of leaves—beautiful.
The Chinese Zodiac Snake Cocktail
According to the Chinese Zodiac,
Snake and Rat meet at a bar, and she slithers away
sipping something a little smoky, a little sexy,
a little jalapeño mixed with tequila, because
Light my fire, baby, light my fire, she’s thinking, ready
to devour the Rat Man whole, and the Snake Woman’s
a seductress—fire embodied, the face and body
that launched a million ships into the night, that oversexed
little human who really means no harm,
unlike Eve’s serpent of the candied apple,
but really, who wouldn’t have been seduced by that creature
so long and graceful, long and graceful,
baristas had to name a coffee after her: The Snake in the Grass
made of mint and mocha and a shot of espresso--
Ice me, baby, ice me, or what about the cocktail
of gin and vermouth and lemon and ice,
and let her sneak up on you, and why don’t you imagine
you’re stuck in the sheets, a boa constrictor slithering
up your way, and would you push her off? You’ve got
to admit that even if you’re terrified, you’re turned on,
and the Snake Woman is a seductress ready to swallow
the Rat Man whole, and he loves how she’s wise,
good with money, a little arrogant, and in Chinese culture,
if you’re called a snake, it’s a real compliment—a good eye,
the cunning to succeed, beautiful eyes, and I learn this
when I’m six, stunned, facing a yellow snake caged up
in a pet store in Pennsylvania, and when I go home,
my father reads me a fortune, tells me I’m a snake,
and when I’m fourteen, losing my temper, my mother
tells me about the family fortune teller visits before I was born,
how he warned my parents about my temper:
if I lost it too often, I’d end up a housewife with two children,
and in that moment, at fourteen, I want to cry
at my kitchen table, but my mother tells me in every
case, I marry a handsome man live happily ever after,
and I’m not romantic, but that fairytale’s carried me
through adulthood, the way I think about the animals of the zodiac,
and the Snake Woman’s a seductress,
ready to eat the Rat Man whole, and she’s compatible
with roosters and oxen, but rabbits are too much sex
for too little time, but there’s just something about a snake and a rat
playing cat and mouse at a bar—how she slithers
away, he’s intrigued—she’s hard to read, she swallows him whole,
and they forget about everyone and everything
in the world, in this scene of tension
you could cut with a knife, and it’s sexy the way
she wraps herself around him, and the rest is history, and if the fortune
teller’s right, I can hardly wait to swallow my Rat whole.
I'll Take the Love and Not the Money, Plus Some Oysters by the Half Shell
All I want is a dozen oysters at the hotel bar,
no mignonette or lemon required,
and don’t the best nights start this way:
I’m hankering for an iced seafood platter
or a dirty martini with extra olives, or the seven-star suite,
bowling alley and stripper pole included
for a little I-won’t-tell-if-you-don’t-tell-2-AM-dance
where I’ll take the clothes off your back,
you applaud, and room service of filet mignon
and garlic mashed potatoes miraculously appears,
and don’t you dare betray me the way James Bond
killed that stunner-of-a-Godiva-woman-walking-her-
white-horse-on-the-beach-a-green-bikini, after
they rolled around on the white fur carpet, and before
their room service of caviar and Prosecco arrived,
but instead of all of the above, tonight,
I end up with $1000 in chips at the Blackjack table
because some guy I met at a Scottsdale bar
called a limo to Talking Stick Casino & Resort,
insisting I play the role of eye candy,
but no, I’m not the girl who blows on dice for luck,
so, he buys me that $1000—will I take the lust
or just run with the money, picturing '90s Demi Moore
rolling in the dough, in her prime, what an Indecent
Proposal, and oh, the thought of starring in an XXX
where money’s the lover is just so appealing,
but I think the answer is I’ll steal the $$$
and be with the one I actually love, but is it stealing
if it’s rightfully mine—how the best feeling in life
is a beautiful woman whispering in your ear
or what about Botticelli’s Venus rising out of that scallop shell,
her Victoria’s Secret curls ready for a little romp
on a seashell bed like an Old Hollywood actress playing
peek-a-boo of find the pearl, spread my legs,
cater to my every whim, pearls wrapped around my breasts,
a pearl necklace as a thong, or what about Japanese
love hotel roleplay where we get it on to the fish and mermaids
in this make-believe tank of a wall, or if you’d prefer,
we can watch the solar system, and all I want is a dozen
oysters from the hotel bar, and I’ll leave the money,
and instead we can have nicer things like spaceships
and shellfish and romantic tension, and oh, oh,
your face, smiling underneath the sheets
when room service knocks on our bedroom door.
--
Dorothy Chan is the author of Revenge of the Asian Woman (Diode Editions, Forthcoming March 2019), Attack of the Fifty-Foot Centerfold (Spork Press, 2018), and the chapbook Chinatown Sonnets (New Delta Review, 2017). She was a 2014 finalist for the Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship, and her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Academy of American Poets, The Cincinnati Review, The Common, Diode Poetry Journal, Quarterly West, and elsewhere. Chan is the Editor of The Southeast Review and Poetry Editor of Hobart. Visit her website at dorothypoetry.com.