Wearing My Chinese Name

after Shira Erlichman

Instead of teaching you how to say 我爱你,

I’ll don my Chinese name. I’ll drape
myself in the ​mélange​ of 王书瑶—

no, not 王, as in ​Is it Wang or Wong​? Not 忘,

because despite all the living, let me not forget
how to be soft-bodied. I want the 王,

as in filing the Title IX report, no matter

the years that have elapsed.
As in my father’s steadfast belief in God,

despite the overhead silence & the evolving

reasons to quit. As in, I’ll hold myself
at night if I have to. Oh, & how I adore

the perfume of 书, the mist

of words my parents threaded
into my name.

I, too, want to linger

in space. It was the 东风,
the wind billowing from the motherland, that insisted

I smell the air. The salt of the Dalian sea​ ​wrinkling

my mother’s toes.
Ginger & garlic at every meal to cleanse

the body, to find the 王. But I can’t leave

the house without 瑶. The Chinese superhero cape.

My not-so-secret

secret power. Don’t you forget the 王

rooted within it. 瑶 as in the resplendence
of mother-of-pearl. I want to see

my parents holding me in the hospital, small

& devastating,​ ​convinced

that I knew how to produce
my own shelter. 瑶 because

how do I teach you to possess this faith?

I want 瑶 not for merely reflecting
the light, but 瑶, as in, let me embody

this whole skeleton.

Read more from Issue No. 26 or share on Twitter.