The tulip on the girl’s lap. The water tonguing through the holes in the pot, braced by foil. The soil smelling like new blood. The smoke whorling shy out of the Bronco’s hood. The heads of the siblings bent as stalks of wheat, limp in repose. The cold distance between the driver and the mother. The rumors planted by the driver at the Korean Catholic church. The expanse of time before it becomes too late to retract. The cordon separating the mother from this knowledge. The proximal near-sleep of the girl but for her vigilance about the tulip. The neighborhood flooding the windshield. The splinter of streetlight between eucalyptus teeth. The streetlamps taller than a Dairy Queen. The first flames licking the mother’s side. The long flicker of denial. The distance the car still carries. The proximal impotence of home. The engine which could not wait to self-immolate. The urgent need to immolate now.
Marissa Yang Bertucci is a Korean dyke writer, printmaker, and calligrapher in Portland, OR. Their work wrestles with 한 han, an untranslatable and contested feeling of (among other things) rue and ire. @marissayangbertucci
