Toast Wong

the body is an apartment in chinatown

i'm not in love with the place, i tell her
a couple of south ontario winters will have that effect
the decades are starting to yellow the wallpaper
but it's nice enough, it'll do for now

i've got some good bones here
despite the couple dents in the wall
scratches i left from some bad nights
litter the halls like pictures from when we were kids

and we can thrift a couch, and maybe a rug
from the value village in roncy
throw on a fresh coat, clear out the cobwebs,
hang up some tattoos we got on a whim

it's not much
but you can really make a home here

if you tried
you can really make a home here

untitled

it is snowing in april
and i am finding your hair in the sink

i used to brush it off your face
as you planted kisses on me
like queen anne's lace
littering the side of the river

you used to laugh as i spat it out
swimming with my mouth wide open
as if i could catch a stream in my fists
and ask it to stay

i let it swirl down the drain
letting the rest of you return to sea

.

adonai does not speak my tongue
so i tried to find it between your lips
desperation settled into my bones
nestled like dust between old polaroids

i could spend months
with my eyes closed
my fingers wrapped tightly
around yours

when i awoke i still felt like
a stranger in my own skin
foreign to the touch

.

i was born to the credit august 1996
a century after the british
took the harbour and the island

one day i'll return to her arms
welcomed by the watercress and minnows
as the airbag and seatbelt hold me tight

falling at a rate slower than 9.81m/s2
i have a hard time distinguishing
between being weightless
and drowning

Toast Wong is an activist, engineer and butch idiot living in Toronto, Ontario. Growing up on the Credit River, she writes about diaspora and gender, divorce and science with a lack of regard for her physical integrity. Sometimes, late at night, you can see her drive like an asshole in the West End.