The Chinese word for endurance is the word for ‘knife’ atop the word ‘heart’
winner, erica hom
“Potent and unafraid in its offering of oral history, familial loss, and personal truth, this poem vividly bites back with a ‘sharpness folded inward’ that pays homage to matriarchal wisdom. The speaker’s direct address compels the poem forward as each line moves with ease and intensity. What a powerful anthem and poem to live by!”
- Mai Der Vang
[End Page 153]
Little girl, don’t be afraid. Catch the sky as it falls. Fold each fragment into a blanket.When I had a fever, our stove became an altar. Ninang stirred bitter herbs in a cauldron and prayed Come sit.Medicine; another sharpness we swallow Like how rain soaked earth swallows your brother’s small coffin Your mother’s sock drawer swallows a polaroid of a harelipped baby. For weeks, my mother swallows nothing.In the garden, moth eaten spinach leaves Shake against the wind like bullet pierced flags.Ninang slices open the red belly of a watermelon,savors the sweetness & spits away each dark seed.Mother taught me to keep a knife under my pillow. Taught me how to measure rice with my sharpest knuckle. Showed me which mushroomswhen consumed, could kill a man just in case.Little girl, don’t believe when they saypoison is a woman’s weapon.
I know it’s whatever edge we hide within softness our sharpness folded inward.This time, my mother hands me the blade. [End Page 154]
Erica Hom is a Filipina-diaspora poet, artist, and educator. Her writing has been featured in various online magazines, art installations, and print publications, including West Trade Review, Room Magazine, The Arkansas International, Honey Literary, Sidewalk Poetry, Voices from the Attic, and the Midway Journal. Her work was awarded the CD Wright’s Emerging Poets Prize and was twice nominated for Best of the Net.
