Mr. Yuan grew up in rural China and currently works as an English tutor in Vancouver, where he co-edits *Poetry Pacific* with Allen Qing Yuan (Poetry submissions to Poetry Pacific welcome at editors.pp@gmail.com).
Gold, lemon, butter, rapeseed flowers:
Pre-positioned, you function to lead
A whole column of evils as in the yellow
Peril, bastards, bellies, dogs, fish, guts
Journalism, heels, even men and pups
After words, you will become as noble
As imperial, as royal, or as Chinese Yellow. That makes all the difference
Between a noun and an adjective
Between Chinese and English
God has long been dead
Hero has also vanished
All supermen and superwomen
Are returning to their own worlds
Except animals that are left alone, lonely
On this shrinking planet, like the hooligans
On the street, like the villains at the corners
Of the office, like the distressed, disabled, dislocated
As presidents, prime ministers, legislators, judges
And, given enough time, we are going to prove that we
Are all no more or no less than earthlings, who will destroy
This little blue ball, or be destroyed here, unless the few lucky
Ones are able to depart from our home world, somehow, sooner than later
In the1950s, our uncles brought forth
A civilization, conceived in electronics
And dedicated to the cause that all
Machines were created to be equal
To apathetic humans when a message was sent
From a lab at some campus, which can
Think logically, but not respond emotionally:
Whether you like it or not
This semi-being would never speed up
A moment even though you are dying
Nor will it slow down when it is to crash
Neither a smallest smile to hear The greatest news, nor a smattering of
Sadness over the loss of your dearest
It keeps working at the pre-determined pace
Always indifferent of the people
By the people and for the people
Until we all perish with the earth
How do we love thee? Let us count the ways:
We love thee to the very limits of high-science
The boundaries of technologies, the frontiers of
The human conscience; in particular we love thy
Art of work on a mother feeding her baby in a
Shelter, a sheep boy driving his little herd to the
Valley, or a crowd of country lads celebrating a Wedding.
More important, we love the way thou Help us to get rid of all extra food processors
In the human shape: the poor, the sick, the weak
The old, all wanted or unwanted others, above all
We love the way thou have become a real game as
Bloodily vivid as a movie on a vast colored screen
Thousands of miles far, far away in an other world
