Time Slows Down
Moments of falling and leaping with my father
Time slows down as the ground gets closer
Wind tearing through jacket seams like water through a sieve
The Time I left the tap running while I sieved cooked pasta in the sink at a family gathering
And you called me a wasteful idiot in front of your friends
The Time you took me to a white-shirt only kind of sports club to play badminton with you
But I had only an orange shirt, and so that’s what I wore
A white man approaching me mid-match,
And sneering “We have a dress code here”
Dress codes. A cleaned-up way to say: Everyone should look the same
The hot shame I feel from being singled out. Wondering why he didn’t storm up the same way to the white guy in a black Nirvana shirt the next court over
The bewilderment of you defending the man instead of me. Saying that anything with colour was distracting to the other players — affecting their ability to see while they played
Me wondering that if mere colours were distracting enough to create problems, how they managed to keep their cars from crashing as they drove through the city every day
Time slows down as the ground gets closer
That time we were in the car, and I was making funny snorting noises with my nose, and you told me to stop it
And when I didn’t, your hand leaving the steering wheel in a flash quicker than I could believe, and striking me in the face
And then you daring me to do it again
That Time we were in China, the first Time after we left, and a family friend was asking me questions about myself
You interrupting me, and saying to the friend “She doesn’t speak Chinese”
In the middle of me answering in Chinese
That Time I was eleven, and mom dragging me at night to the living room in my pyjamas and screaming she was going to throw me out because I wasn’t practising piano
You standing behind her and watching
Complicit and silent
Time slows down as the ground gets closer
That Time I was just old enough to walk on my own, and you taking me to the field behind our house to catch grasshoppers in your cupped hands for my delight
That Time it was my seventh birthday, and I was dressed up pretty with a red and yellow layered skirt, white patent leather shoes, and a barrette in my hair, and you saying to me
“What’s going to happen when one day you decide you’re too pretty for your daddy and want to leave him at home?”
That Time you were an exchange student abroad, alone and younger than I am now, preparing to return home to your family
And then learning that home had just been set on fire by what the World would know as The Tiananmen Square massacres
You deciding to remain and sponsoring us as refugees of our own country to come and start a new life where you were
That Time you and mom flew across the country with me to set me up at university, and when it was time to say goodbye in the lobby of my student residence, I couldn’t wait for you to be gone
But when you gave me an awkward pat resembling a hug and turned to go, I saw your face change
You turned away quickly, but it was the first time in my life I saw you cry
Time slows down as the ground gets closer
Time slows down
And then the ground stretches out
Flailing arms catch the wind
Desperately at first
Then shakily, levelling out
All those Times the World threw us from the Tower
All those Times we leapt
Gravity treats you the same when you’re falling
But the Ground no longer kills us with its kiss of death
Because the World didn’t catch us
Because we’ve been smashed and erased
All those Times before
We learned to catch ourselves
So that This Time
We could live