by Marilyn Chin

From The Phoenix Gone,
the Terrace Empty
Milkweed Editions 1994

? 1994 by Marilyn Chin. Used with permission from Milkweed. Previously published in The American Voice.

The dead piled up, thick, fragrant, on the fire escape.
My mother ordered me again, and again, to sweep it clean.
All that blooms must fall. I learned this not from the Tao,
but from high school biology.

Oh, the contradictions of having a broom and not a dustpan!
I swept the leaves down, down through the iron grille
and let the dead rain over the Wong family's patio.

And it was Achilles Wong who completed the task.
We called her:
The-one-who-cleared-away-another-family's-autumn.
She blossomed, tall, benevolent, notwithstanding.

Marilyn Chin was born in Hong Kong and raised in Portland, Oregon. She is currently on the faculty of the MFA program at San Diego State University.

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