My Nature Seeks the Wild

Jocelyn Ulevicus

Year of the Horse (2002)

By Stephanie Chang

Issue 42 • Fall 2020 • Poetry

2nd Place Poetry

2020 Summer Contest

“Year of the Horse” is a beautiful poem that complicates familial narratives. The scenes and the imagery are astonishing—they recharge the familiar. Each couplet is perfectly crafted, rich with linguistic pleasures. What a joy to encounter such fine work. .

– Eduardo Corral

I shipwreck every sunset that frames

this city’s best features. The bells

and whistles of bone: a bit around

my breast. My mother says glory

has nothing to do with grief.

All afternoon, I caramelize

my corpse. My bloodline hung

as laundry. A prop pistol

fired blank: this body stolen

out of slow motion. I learn

there is no version of this myth

where I don’t win. At home,

a man bruises my mother’s face

into tapioca. She plucks leaves

from the dark, makes tea. I return to her

dirt-drunk, miles ahead

of every past life where she passes

away. We sit for an interview

on the study of things faster

than the speed of light. I return

a blur. My body a blemish of bullet.

As she boils the skins off peaches

I ask, have you eaten? Eaten well?

Tell me about your day. Are you

unwell? Meanwhile, eight suns drip

piss. Screen test: The horizon

o-mouthed over sour candy:

Sky caked in smoke that sobs

some story about a saddle.

Cut back to home:

My mother tapes a peach

to the window. Tapes

this film for repeat viewing.

She purchases prayers

off Taobao, echoes the on-sale scripture

for a god who claims

he can outsmart the end of the world.

At her request, I present pearls

as proof of the millions of moons

I outran, pocketed

along my teeth. Play along—

I was born knowing a thing

or two about disaster. Disaster

my better name. The catalyst

that calls me home. Disaster depicts

my want as wanton.

The film reel tunnels red

my neck. My mother

sobs over a pair of scissors,

drowns herself in the end credits.

The camera lens, carved

out of sweat, catches it all:

Every sun shot down

was shot in technicolor.

Every color I cremate

reincarnates as sunrise.

Stephanie Chang

Stephanie Chang (she/they) is a Sino-Canadian writer and rising freshman at University College London. Her work appears in The Kenyon Review, Adroit Journal, Waxwing, Penn Review, Diode Poetry Journal, and Berkeley Poetry Review. She has been recognized by the Adroit Prize for Poetry, Anthony Quinn Foundation, and Poetry Society of the UK. Stephanie has participated in the Kenyon Young Writers Workshop, Adroit Mentorship Program, and Speakeasy Project. Currently, she edits for Sine Theta Magazine, a print-based publication by and for the Sino diaspora.

Jocelyn Ulevicus

Jocelyn Ulevicus is an artist and writer with work forthcoming or published in magazines such as the Free State Review, The Petigru Review, Quince Magazine, and Humana Obscura. Working from a female speculative perspective, themes of nature and the unseen; and exit and entry are dominantly present in her work. She resides in Amsterdam and is currently working on her first book of poems. To see her artwork and her cute cat, Pilar, visit her on IG @beautystills.