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— Vladimir Nabokov, Letters to Véra 

 [I Love you. I Adore you very much. My Joy. My dear love.]

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Emily Dickinson’s Herbarium, circa 1839-1846 (Houghton Library, Harvard)

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Wendy Cope, From June to December: Summer Villanelle

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Afghanistan, 2013.

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obsessed with these green things called trees

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Virginia Woolf, from The Waves

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Artist's Sketch of a Swallow, Thebes, Egypt, ca. 1479-1458 B.C.

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pillows on my lover’s bed

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Li’s Thursdays comprised of one thing without fail; a facetime session with his nai and ye. The two of them were retired and by no means needed to go anywhere unless it was to get food or see their friends– who happened to be their neighbours anyway, so he knew he could call whenever. When Li called after just waking up, the answer is prompt, his nai smiling into the phone from the other side, before it falls into a frown just as quick as her smile had appeared.

“You just woke up? Your hair is a mess, go and eat. Why are you calling before you’ve started your day, hm?” It was just like his nai to meet him with such remarks and demands before even muttering a hello, and Li’s lips curl into a smile as he rolls onto his side in bed, cheek squished into his palm that's between him and the pillow as he fondly watches her prop the phone up against something or other so that she could view him better. From that angle, he could see her better too. Her hair was dark and short around her slender face. She had always been beautiful to Li, even with the lines that sat on the corners of her mouth and eyes that only got deeper as the years went on. He could see bits of his Ma in her, and it always left him wondering; would she have looked like this when she got older?

“Soon, soon. I just wanted to talk to you for a bit. Is yeye there too? What are you guys doing today?” His mandarin comes easily, a tasteful change from the constant Korean, save for the moments he got to share with some of the people closest to him who dabbled in the language.

“He’s watching TV, you know how he is… always watching something. We’ll be going shopping later, we want to buy some new sheets for the futon, they’re old now.” She says as she fumbles with a piece of pen and paper – likely to write a shopping list.

“Nai, save your money. You don’t have to, I don’t mind, neither does my friend.” The word friend echoes heavily in his mind, but he doesn't dwell on it. Li flattens some of his hair as he looks at his tired reflection in his iPhone, silence filling the space aside from the chatter of TV in the background. Eventually, while still looking at his sleepless eyes, he speaks again. “Have you seen baba around lately? Or heard from him, maybe?” The word ‘baba’ tastes like poison and he wishes there was a term more fitting but saying something like ‘have you seen my sperm donor?’  to his grandparents likely wouldn’t be received well.

“No, we told you last time you called, too. You need to stop asking, the answer hasn’t changed.” Nai is firm in her reply, pen scribbling away momentarily before she looks up at the phone again. “Why do you keep asking, huh? You want to see him?”

“No! No… I don’t want to. I’m just... nervous I’ll run into him.” Li swallows, the dryness in his throat not easing with it. Upon the fact that his trip to China was nearing, he’d been getting increasingly more worried about running into his dad, whom, the last time he’d seen him, had threatened some horrible things. Things that no 'father' should ever say to their child.

“You won’t, the last I heard of him was that he was with a new woman. I hope he hasn’t done what he did to your mother to her. I feel sorry for anyone who knows that man.” She grumbles, and Li can see the pain of loss across her face for just a second, before she’s back to chirping at him again. “But, I did hear from your auntie. She’s a lesbian now, living in America with her fiancé. Can you believe that? All this time we thought she was in Shanghai!” Her exasperated tone rings out over the phone, and Li’s heart pounds a little harder in his chest.

“Huh? She– she is? That’s why you never heard about any kids then…” His face feels flush, he knows why well enough himself, having held the same secret as his auntie for as long as he could remember. “Well…are you guys okay with all that?”

“She calls us out of nowhere to ask for money and tells me she is in love with a woman after not talking to me for six years. I am not okay with it! What kind of daughter does that, hm?” There’s a shake of her head, dark locks bouncing a little around her face as she does.

“Oh. Yeah…” Li swallows a little more, now, and can only stare at his nai through the phone, who’s head was down while scribbling away again. There’s more silence, more TV chatter in the back as Li mulls over what’s been said. His dad with a new person, likely repeating the same habits he’d subjected his Ma to, and his aunt was, in fact, a lesbian that seemed disgraced by his grandparents.

The news is a little too much for him, all of it, to the point that he wants to hang up without warning but he’s frozen in place, finger left hovering over the red button that would put him and his grandparents back in their retrospective worlds– them, in China, him, in bed in Korea. He almost commits to hanging up when finally, his ye appears over the shoulder of his Nai, a weathered hand gracing her shoulder with tenderness.

He speaks in Cantonese that Li easily understands, his greying hair cropped short, and his face seems as unbothered as ever with a touch of softness that Li knew was something only him and his nai only got to see. “It’s fine that she likes women. We just don’t like that she expects money all of a sudden. For a wedding, her wedding.” It was as if ye had been listening and, noticing the lack of chatter from his side, had come to unknowingly reassure him. There had been hints that his grandpa knew about Li’s preferred partner, but neither of them had ever said a word on the topic, and Li was far too afraid to. Regardless, he was thankful for the way his grandpa could feel his discomfort through the phone and came to lift that off his shoulders a little.

“Right... But good for her… Must be nice.” He tucks some of his hair out of his face, unable to look at the two of them now who were staring at him through the phone.

“Waisun, don’t worry, you’ll find your special lady one day soon, then you’ll be asking us for money too.” Nai comments, laughing and resuming her list-writing.

“Forget about dating, just study, the right person will show up.” Is what ye follows up with, then comes a scolding to nai under his breath.

It makes Li smile, but doesn't ease the churning of his stomach, and they chat for some time more until finally, Li gets up to go about his day. There’s still a knot in the pits of his being and he’s still not quite sure how to shake it; so he spends the day lost in a world of smudged charcoals and paints to keep whatever heinous thoughts were daring to sit at the forefront of his mind locked away.

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The Cathedral, Auguste Rodin (1840 -1917)

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a prayer

Les Félins (René Clément), Days of Being Wild (Wong Kar Wai), Malcolm T. Liepke, Gustav Vigeland (Eros and Psyche), Stephan Sinding (Adoration), Soul Eom (kiss, hug and die)

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It must seem odd to ask you out, but I want to ask you something. IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE 花樣年華 2000┃Wong Kar Wai

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via togamin211

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"I shall be waiting for you. You know that when you come home, weary, with blood on your hands, I shall be waiting there among the birches. You will rest your head in my lap, and I shall kiss your burning forehead and wash the blood from you. I shall be waiting, and I shall love you."

—Pär Lagerkvist, The Eternal Smile: Three Stories

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by d-yohoui

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“I am furious with myself. My disguises no longer protect me.”

— Sylvia Plath, from a letter to Ruth Tiffanny Beuscher written c. July 1962 (via violentwavesofemotion)