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Why do we write negative poems?
It’s raining outside-
no, more than that.
The rain falls in blocks,
thick curtains that turn the world to ash and silver,
smothering it in the hiss of splattering drops.
Outside my old home
stood a bamboo tree, four meters tall.
On days like this
(when I wasn’t welded to the TV)
I’d watch its branches bow and sway,
like a fishing rod straining
against some monstrous catch,
the rain pulling, tearing,
heaving to break free.
It struck me, even then,
that I never looked at it that way in sunlight.
When it basked in gold,
reaching for the sky,
I barely noticed.
Even now,
I rarely write about happiness.
Like there’s some invisible limit,
a cringe-o-meter,
to how well I can make joy sound.
Perhaps we like
to lean toward the darker shades.
After all, who stops mid-laugh to ask,
"Why do I feel like this?"
or "Does any of this matter?"
Good times don’t hold still-
they fly.
And so the melancholy truth remains:
that ink flows faster under grey skies
Copyright ©
Shane Zhao
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