a poem by alison roh park

Lovesong


I say you make me feel young again
meaning I will throw water in a man’s face

when he calls you a dyke. I say
you make me feel free again as if it were familiar

meaning I will let the men drag me away from you
by my arms and torso. I say to be whole

again is to remember the feel of this man’s right hand
wrapped into my hair, his left a small boulder

against my temple, my cheek. When I hear you
call my name I shake my body loose, rise and walk

amongst the overturned chairs and broken glass
to where you wait for me. There is blood

on your jacket and on my face and we run
as if there is a sunset outside of this dark place

as if we can take this cab to a place
where we can feel clean again.




Alison Roh Park is a Kundiman fellow, Pushcart-nominated writer and winner of the 2011 Poetry Society of America New York Chapbook Fellowship. Her work has appeared in several publications, including Mythium Literary Magazine and The NuyorAsian Anthology. She holds a Masters of Fine Arts in creative writing, and resides in her native Queens, New York with Kush.