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Jasmine Tsai Poem
Fingertips
fall—
not like
stones,
but like rain,
plucked silver
threading the air.
Each string
holds a hush,
a breath not yet
forgotten.
The musician builds—
not a score,
but the curve
of a heron’s wing
skimming dusk
softly vanishing
in a single glissando.
The guzheng does not speak.
It spills:
vibrato,
a tide rising
then breaking
against memory.
Sound leans back—
not toward silence
——but toward a
distant shore
we once
heard.
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Note: Guzheng is a traditional Chinese musical instrument.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
Day 1
I fall—not through space
something thinner—
like light stretched
too far
across the skin of a thought
I buried years ago
The tunnel hums
with memory—
a child’s scream rising into laughter,
the sting of ozone before the storm
the flicker between blinks
where everything vanishes
Darkness
Sun blinds—
Day 2
The sky is a calm equation—
no clouds, no noise,
just light folded neatly
like fresh hospital sheets
The grass soft as breath.
No bugs. No bruises.
Everyone wears a gentle smile
like they’re born with softness
“Hello, Alice.”
They say it like a blessing.
They say it like I belong.
The air is perfectly
warm, like an infant’s cradle
Day 7
They say God
carved this world out with scalpels
—not one corner flawed
Every turn I’m greeted with
a warm, prepared smile,
“Hello, Alice.”
Nothing bleeds.
Knives are ornaments.
They assume I was born
with the scars on my wrist.
Even sorrow comes in silk-lined boxes,
labeled, packed,
ready to ship away
I tried to cry
The air wiped the tears dry
The silence tastes sweet here
and I cringe at the taste of sugar
Day 18
I tore up the garden today.
The tulips giggled
as I snapped their necks.
No dirt beneath—just
velvet lining.
I screamed into my reflection
in the lake with no ripples.
She smiled back
lips curled at a planned angle
I wandered around the city
grabbing strangers by the wrists
I want to shake their smile off their faces—
What hurts here? I ask
They blink:
What’s that?
Day 19
A couple invited me to dinner.
Ray and Jay.
They’ve never fought.
They finish each other’s sentences
like synchronized clocks.
They agree
on the color of the sheets,
the taste of strawberries,
how long to hold eye contact.
I watched them toast to peace.
I wanted to scream
just to see if they’d flinch—
I don’t know how much more I can take.
Day ??
I stepped off the roof
Not for death, no—
i just want a crack in the lined tiles
hair unravelled by wild wind
a cut that stings before it heals
But the air caught me,
soft as a baby’s first blanket
I landed on a bed of
roses with no thrones
Ray helped me up
while Jay offered me apple tea
“Hello, Alice,” they said
“Welcome back to the dream.”
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
Near the end of my journey,
the sky rains rusty gold, grains from
heaven cleanse my earthy pores
—Bites of crimson filth spread
a plague of exhausted stars
I let them devour in glee—
I am no longer attached to my
physical form; In the eyes there were
too many deaths—
azaleas, sandcastles, and rosy dreams
The air scrapes off
sin, along with skin and the mess underneath
I can barely see myself—the porcelain blue
peeks through the silhouette of my toes
I feel feathery—
At the end of my journey blossoms
a field gently sprinkling pink
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
Summer never stood a chance
against us, when even
in the still air our hearts flutter—
There will always be thunder
and rain, you said.
But in being in love with you
—It’s a slow dance, you and I
in crystal air, rain or clear,
under blankets of stars—
In your eyes there are
sparks only love can light,
softness only love can touch.
A lifetime worth of words—and more,
but they can wait, I want to
blend your touch into my ink first.
You asked why I fall.
But I didn’t—
I saw you, and I jumped.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
Dried-up,
___a stream___
in the moor, no-man’s land.
When a soul dares near—
a gunshot blooms
/ Red /
the barren soil
will feast on
anything.
You said amid this desert stands
—an oasis—
A land of innocence, but where you crown sins.
(Greedy, yes,
but that’s all humanity ever is.)
I begged you to point me to the shrine
yet I am left stumbling,
...blind...
Before what was left
of the roads once promised direction—
I drop
to my knees,
cracked soil tears my skin.
In no-man’s land—
there are no breaths ahead.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
ghostly gray petals—
a shadow crossing the grass
I stepped on a name
______________
A minimalist reflection on mourning and the erosion of identity, set in the asphodel fields of Greek myth, where unremarkable souls wander without memory…
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
My hasty steps echo
on the cracked stone tile,
before the bus door hisses
shut—Late again.
"It's a wonderful life," the clouds sing in chorus.
Their church choir harmony almost offensive,
if I didn't know,
they truly believe
life is lullabies and steaming apple tea.
Swear-soaked hair clings to my neck.
I call these ember days:
when smoldering urban air chokes—
Yet the clouds drift,
marshmallow white—
Like porcelain swans on azure water.
I watch the bus hustle
away, breath too ragged
to properly curse.
The clouds grin,
like they're genuinely satisfied—
—just being.
Wouldn't that be something.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
I had a dream last night. When I looked into the mirror, I was wearing a denim mid-skirt with boots, and a dramatic yellow top with feathers—things I would never wear, least of all on a steaming summer day. I looked around and found myself on the dock, where my grandparents live in Keelung, Taiwan. My father’s ship departed from here when he was a marine; My mother would stand on the squeaky wooden platform as he left. The wind was damp and chilling—it’s always raining here, at my grandparents’. I used to hate it as a child, but I had a distinct memory from when I was an infant: when I cry, my father would take me to the bathroom and open the rain shower—the sound of rain would quiet me down, then my memory would black out. I guess I fell asleep...
A high-pitch note
———cut—through
my memory like shears.
I’m back on the dock, in denim skirt and boots and that funny yellow top. Then I saw her, a siren. I thought of her yesterday, when she surfaced in my poem. I've seen her before, once, in what I thought was hallucination. Her hair in a quaint braid, draped over one shoulder. Her skin aquamarine, so delicate I think I saw the veins underneath—but no blood was flowing. And her eyes—oh, her eyes—they were a milk-like off-white. A color somehow both calming and chilling. She hummed from somewhere deep in the sea. So far out I couldn’t have seen or heard, let alone fear her—Yet I did. Her voice coiled around my throat like a silent collar, ready to claim what once was mine—Suddenly she's in front of me. I tried to fight back, but what can one do when her vocal cords were ripped out brutally? So thin, those fragile cords. And yet, they alone stood between me and my voice. I wanted to grab them and stuff them back into my throat, but—she smiled like an innocent carol, then devoured them in front of me. My arms dropped. I nearly collapsed, but her touch froze me up right. Her lifeless touch sealed my bleeding wound, then my throat, then my mouth then nostrils then the rest of my limped body. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe—
Then I woke up,
cold sweat soaked my hair.
I still couldn’t breathe.
I reached for my throat—
she actually took my voice.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
will love be decrepit when
trust is just a word thrown when we cannot win fights,
an excuse rather than a gospel… or is it long before then?
will love be decrepit when
she is home waiting, and he is alone under neon lights,
both drinking, asking, “can we ever be in the same room again?”
when she cannot speak as chaos seep into her pen,
and he cannot sleep knowing they want different nights
when there's no words left to exchange, is love decrepit then?
will love be decrepit when
he tells lies to avoid explanations, and she overlooks them to avoid fights.
a facade of rose gold castle, but what comes after then?
the silence in the castle can blind us, when
we swallow our differences to avoid plights.
love doesn’t lie, but people in love do, is love decrepit then?
truth is never love’s friend, not when
love falters the minute truth bites.
when we ask “will love be decrepit when—”
—it's already decrepit then.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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Jasmine Tsai Poem
As a child, colors weave the way I dream,
Then what I feel and how I perceive.
My humming voice a dandelion stream.
Carnation pink, fairytales I used to believe.
As I grow my color palette shifts,
From rainbow of softness to only neutral gray.
I wear black heels, prepare neon gifts
For dinner parties I have to stay.
Sometimes I remember, how colors linger,
How my fingers once, on paper, dragged out hue.
It smears my dream in orange and lavender,
My crayon box, the only thing staying true.
I know my paintings inevitably go unseen,
Still, every night, I color my dream spring green.
Copyright © Jasmine Tsai | Year Posted 2025
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