Yesterday, when my grandfather finally passed on,
it was as though the feelings I’d felt and known to feel
at once went unprocessed. “It’s the end of a chapter,”
one uncle said, more soundingly than he’d intended.
For my grandfather, it was an end of suffering;
for us also, we didn’t have to urge him to prise his eyes open,
watch his temperature rollercoaster, check for blood
on the bedclothes. My uncles took prompt care of the business,
calling the undertakers and speaking of timings and packages.

I knew that I had only to expect an inhumane
cloud of incense, rice wine poured out on the ground,
a clanging cymbal and the chant of ritual Cantonese.
Knew, also, that I’d cancel my appointments but not let on
the reason, guarding my grief like a jewel in a trinket-box.
I had to start, with a coffee to clear my nose, even if
the Starbucks girl had seen it all a hundred times before.
You don’t set off door sensor bells
at the hospital florists for quite the same reasons.

This morning I dreamt that I was reading the perfect novel.
It was a murder-mystery about hunting the devil.
Reading it was like riding the surface of an inland sea,
until the trapdoor words slipped me onto another plane
and the hunters turned out to have been foxed.
As I woke the rain was smacking my windows like pachinko.
Its bullets broke up upon impact to four or five or six shards,
which, too fat, bounced off the areca palms below and crashed
into the concrete. Their tracks will disappear but to memory;
There, find the freedom of unnumbered water courses.

I did the numbers game, counting the number of times a piece has been rejected without having been accepted, and am giving you the grand prize winner with a grand total of seven rejections, followed by two dishonourable mentions. I’ve stopped sending these pieces out. It’s only your unorthodox call for submissions that has led me to revive these zombies…

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