Poetry by Cynthia Wang

Edited by Frank Granda

There is an old superstition in our culture

that, you can not write a living person’s name in red

It’s something embedded in my bones—

my mom refusing to sign her name in red,

my grandfather’s in blood on his tombstone

my father’s father’s red envelopes with red burned for him

It is a color of gratitude, prosperity, and fortune,

yet only when there is no name attached to it.

It is a curse, to write one’s name in red

I had gotten hit for it once

How long did you yearn to have me on the ground, wounded, beaten, gasping for air?

When you carved your name on my heart in red, were you cursing yourself or me?

Did you crave the prosperity that my name could bring you? That you would be warm during autumn? Loved even when the leaves would redden and brown — decay, even?

You haunt my dream, my culture, my birthdays.

I stir up to memories of you in my mind.

I jolt awake to the image of red on your hands as you carve and turn me to dust.

I wonder what the curse of writing one’s name in red manifests as.

Do you dream of me? Your fingers hovering over my heart bleeding how you’ve been and deleting it?

Do you dream of me when you stare up at the stars? Your stomach churning?

Do you dream of me when you see the rainbows? The disgust from when your beloved tore me a piece?

You must not. 

Dreams do not connect my mind and yours.

I am not as so cruel as to have a hex curse you to dream of me forever.

I am not so free on time as to manifest it either.

Though, I only wonder for a second. 

Will I curse myself by writing your name in red?

Will I become you by writing your name in bloody letters as I strike the lighter to burn it?

Will it still hold true?

Does it matter? You are dead to me.

So, wake up in the coffin 

of our friendship to kick and scream —

as I once did over you.