Diss Track (Scholarship)
After Aishvarya Arora and Hala Alyan
i lost my life then i lost my life
i hunger to feel hunger
beluga god
like you
i was born again
twice
you slept in the garage
of my ruined body
call us generation rubble
we solved nothing
o lord o god
o emissary of salt
take my ugly desire to own my own life
else take kallang leisure park
before the grass
there was grass
how many times can you say
please
addendum
as if a switch flicked and all the lights blew out at once,
as if no fluvoxamine left unturned,
as if the oxen became a wolf by choice
::
what do i know of malcontent oranges
the almanac of kitchen knives
reams of bark on a tutor’s face
all the good ways of the old ways
not the first thing of courage either
just its imitation
ice in the veins, tundra
stretching for miles
across the world i entered and loved
that first denied my mother
what gave me these books
this language
i loved
i betrayed
::
lonely lord, i feral
if you must come
come
like a serrated lung
Christian Yeo Xuan (he/they) is a writer based in Singapore by way of Beirut and Paris. His work has been published or is forthcoming in Indiana Review, Tupelo Quarterly, Oxford Poetry, The Hajar Book of Rage and New Singapore Poetries, among others. He has placed or been a finalist for the Washington Square Review New Voices Award, the Poetry London Pamphlet Prize, the National Poetry Competition, the Kenyon Review Developmental Editing Fellowship, and the Bridport Prize. He is a Brooklyn Poets Fellow, and has received support from the Kenyon Review Writers’ Workshop, Tin House, Fine Arts Work Centre in Provincetown, Berlin Writers’ Workshop, and the National Arts Council of Singapore. Find out more at christianyeoxuan.com.