[“Every word,” wrote Beckett, “is like an unnecessary stain”]

by Kevin Phan

 

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“Every word,” wrote Beckett, “is like an unnecessary stain on silence & nothingness.” He doubled down on this commitment, with conclusive force, when he died. Ripe with gallows humor, he was born on Good Friday. From Elie Wiesel comes the rebuttal: “We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” I know what I want I want to chorus loud rains. To chant my bye-byes to a crater of bruises. To love brutal beasts reeking fresh kills. Sometimes, silence is the loudest weight. Like a body wholly bodied. “I can’t breathe!” Ain’t it something now. My heart’s the prayer the stars inherit. Jerked by every warning signal, every wonder. Cherry blossoms balancing the dark.

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KEVIN PHAN is a Vietnamese-American graduate of the University of Michigan with an M.F.A. in Creative Writing in 2013 & from the University of Iowa with a B.A. in English Literature in 2005. He is a former Helen Zell Writers’ Program Postgraduate Fellow at the University of Michigan. His work has been featured (or is forthcoming) in Columbia Review, Poetry Northwest, Georgia Review, Conjunctions (online), Crab Orchard Review, Fence, Pleiades, Gulf Coast, Colorado Review, SubTropics, Crazyhorse, Hayden’s Ferry Review, & elsewhere. His first collection of poetry will be published through Colorado State University’s Center for Literary Publishing in 2020.