BOY FROM BATTLE
NOEL PENG
morning breath, the coffins break / open. boy slips under the radar smooth / as skin & his face on / backwards. his own still / life reimagined on the battlefield: two players / at odds. boy shoots and the other cries / wolf for the master that goes to whip / his own son. in the sandbox, the shovel dark brown / the day dark / white but not / gray. here, boy with battle / hymn for daybreak, the wolves forget / to fear. when the shot stills his heart / when boy hangs / each lash his / executioner. boy learns a new / language this thing baptized divorce / called discipline / wears them on his own / sleeve; to the confessional to punish / the wrong hand. is this a sin / loving / the taste of skin, as if aliveness is something / to be fed. at birth boy’s mother crawling / towards him, the same way his father crawls / to beg back the bullet. boy remembers: how he skinned / the pistol until shining / struck the barrel against his knees / quivering. the wine that night thicker than water / loving a whipped / back as red as it is leaking. father captures a still / holds boy as first emerged / the rattle spilling / open like after a feasting, how blessed his skin / white as mother’s milk.
POACH
NOEL PENG
tuesday & you tell me to pick
the eggshells at dusk. so I do. I slip
the first into my pocket & nest
the others under my chin to keep them warm,
I grow feathers instead of a beard.
there is nothing
alive in there, you say. the shells,
a little too soft. a little too white.
I keep them anyway,
bundled skipping stones
on the windowsill. later when
I am drunk, I forget they are eggs & sharpening
against the lake, instead of skipping they
hatch. they are beakless, boneless & I kiss
the first one where the orange should be.
my tongue festers into a brood
pouch; I suck
yolk into my mouth & bloom peach
fuzz. the next day you laugh something
noxious & hatch your own nest. by
sundown yours are full-figured, full-
breasted. unlike me you kiss them
where they are most soft.
glue them to my skin & suddenly I am
less bird than clutch, me feathered &
my throat a red mating call. it is late
when this happens: you tell me
to ready myself for the slaughterhouse,
to dig for mascara & thaw
my lips, to wait at the door until they arrive
with flowers. by dawn I crack
my first egg & drink it down. you take craft
scissors to my thighs; cut where I look more wrapping
paper than skin. then hand me myself: membrane webbed
white glass. me & throat like a ladle, poached until white.
the eggshells at dusk. so I do. I slip
the first into my pocket & nest
the others under my chin to keep them warm,
I grow feathers instead of a beard.
there is nothing
alive in there, you say. the shells,
a little too soft. a little too white.
I keep them anyway,
bundled skipping stones
on the windowsill. later when
I am drunk, I forget they are eggs & sharpening
against the lake, instead of skipping they
hatch. they are beakless, boneless & I kiss
the first one where the orange should be.
my tongue festers into a brood
pouch; I suck
yolk into my mouth & bloom peach
fuzz. the next day you laugh something
noxious & hatch your own nest. by
sundown yours are full-figured, full-
breasted. unlike me you kiss them
where they are most soft.
glue them to my skin & suddenly I am
less bird than clutch, me feathered &
my throat a red mating call. it is late
when this happens: you tell me
to ready myself for the slaughterhouse,
to dig for mascara & thaw
my lips, to wait at the door until they arrive
with flowers. by dawn I crack
my first egg & drink it down. you take craft
scissors to my thighs; cut where I look more wrapping
paper than skin. then hand me myself: membrane webbed
white glass. me & throat like a ladle, poached until white.
UBACCIÓN, 1938
NOEL PENG
In Czechia they ask
for snake stains puncturing cheeks
into discs, suck the fat out their
cavities.
Meanwhile, Nanjing asks
to drink
the underbellies of children.
There, mortuaries lay belly-
rounded, birthing baby teeth for
a black market.
There is the street name where he lay
his body roughshod against her thighs.
Here, her stomach emptied a casket,
yearned for skin against an iron rattle. Here,
the poultry aisle flickered into white, her name
unpronounceable. Here is where the boys from backyard came
sweeping in with their gelled teeth.
How they learned to kiss with their mouths
closed was all rutting – gamed the meat into bite-sized bruises.
In the end it was all road-
kill in her stomach,
their gold filling. And her, cradling it where
it was most dark.
for snake stains puncturing cheeks
into discs, suck the fat out their
cavities.
Meanwhile, Nanjing asks
to drink
the underbellies of children.
There, mortuaries lay belly-
rounded, birthing baby teeth for
a black market.
There is the street name where he lay
his body roughshod against her thighs.
Here, her stomach emptied a casket,
yearned for skin against an iron rattle. Here,
the poultry aisle flickered into white, her name
unpronounceable. Here is where the boys from backyard came
sweeping in with their gelled teeth.
How they learned to kiss with their mouths
closed was all rutting – gamed the meat into bite-sized bruises.
In the end it was all road-
kill in her stomach,
their gold filling. And her, cradling it where
it was most dark.
NOEL PENG is a writer and musician from the Bay Area of California, currently serving as co-founder and manager at the Glass Kite Anthology. A 2014 California Arts Scholar and alumna of the Adroit Journal Mentorship Program and Winter Tangerine Review Summer Workshop, her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Cadaverine, and The Best Teen Writing of 2016, among others. She is seventeen years old.
