Confessions of a Woman,
Seventy Years Old or Less

by Tammy Ho Lai-ming

I tried, again and again, to re-capture moments
of the past that are now really gone.
Sure, people of different ages do foolish things
appropriate to their particular age.

In the past I stole berries from the kitchen sink,
secretly plucked my eyebrows when adults weren’t
watching, skipped showers several nights at a time,
swallowed broken fingernails.

Outside the windows, tree branches swing
in the autumn wind like tap dancers. The young
girl, my neighbour, opens and closes the balcony door
alternatively. One
moment she lets in the seducing wind,
another moment she is coy. Oh yes, this is what
youth embodies – the right to hesitate.

And did I babble about default hope? That wonderful
feathered thing with spikes. What will impress
me now? Not hope, but a well-written poem,
a painting of a rainbow, a speech about unexpected
incidents of a not very despondent nature.

Poem first appeared in Muse.

A Moment at a Housewarming Party

by Tammy Ho Lai-ming

Two felines materialised from nowhere,
one grey, one fading bronze
with glass eyes blindingly bright.
In the living room where I smoked a cheap
cigar for the first time, the desktop speakers
vomited music that was apt
for hip-dancing.

Pictures tattooed the walls,
white and navy blue.

“Nowhere to shit the ash!” I shouted into
one exquisite ear. A pair of hands
then formed a flesh bowl ornamented
with palm lines. I exhaled obvious
drowsiness, though midnight was
too early to retire.

More people climbed in through the first floor window.
The apartment was like a tree house, lowly built.
For a second, I thought we were
a collection of birds –

pecking half-rounds of brie,
drinking White Russians, smoking each other’s breath
and waiting – waiting a lifetime,
for the calm outside,
oppressive and taciturn,
to subside.

Poem first appeared in Softblow.

I Once Called a Man Fat

by Tammy Ho Lai-ming

On purpose, I say the meanest things.
Not to strangers
Or people who step on my nerves.
Admit it: we save the worst
For those who love us;
We know their forgiveness
Is infinite.

I once called a man fat;
And told him not to walk beside me.
Late December, his trail of footprints
On the Scandinavian snow
Formed a sequence of
Displaced Morse code.

He tripped, and I only knew
When a passer-by stabbed me
A reproachful eye.
And there he was,
Stumbling to get up,
Like a light sleeper
Waking from an exciting dream.

Poem first appeared in Apple Valley Review.

Minute

by Tammy Ho Lai-ming

Every meal with your family counts,
he said. You know we’re all
renting this place – Earth. When
we leave new tenants take
us for granted. What kind of
rent are we paying, Dad? Life.
Who is the landlord? Life.

He kept pouring me tea, milk,
coffee, soup. The list is not finished.
He reflected that when he first realised
‘life goes on,’ he was forty. Wasn’t
that a bit late? I felt that rumbling
wheel of life many many books ago.

This is not a competition, he
said. You are so spoiled. I had no
time to philosophise: I worked,
or I starved.

It was hardly fair. I always think
some people’s hours are longer. Time
for me to leave home again, not to
come back for months. I am scared
of the clock, he said. What? That
clock above the cupboard. Look,
the arms just never seem to stop.

The two of us looked, nervously,
at that clock that had so frightened
him. That longest minute in my
life. That shortest.

Poem first appeared in Muse.

The Famine, 1959-62

by Tammy Ho Lai-ming

One said, he felt like he was a horse: wild,
Low, hungry, when he was chewing – chewing –
Chewing – chewing those endless biscuits of
Hard grass and tree bark.
One said, doors were unnecessary:
There was nothing to steal.
When she was four and a half, she witnessed this
From an unfinished window (no nails,
No frames, no metal): the old granny
Who sold fish lay flat on the ground,
Her arms were swollen like pig’s legs. Her round
Calves were like spiral paper lanterns, but bruised. An
Innocently remembered image unshed through time:
Fifty years, and her open and red wrinkled eyes  
Still glare.

Poem first appeared in Singapore Review.