by Janet Jiahui Wu

The clock does not tick. The rose does not bloom. The chairs are rotting in the rain and then tomorrow they will be bleaching in the sun.

When mother decided to not transfer the property to me, I torn up pictures of her and cut holes in her great coats. “Get a job. Become anything but what you are,” she said. I packed everything that night and left the next morning. I didn’t tell her where I was going. 

I couldn’t change her, and she couldn’t change me. Year of silence followed. Now we talk at least once a week.

Janet Jiahui Wu is a nonbinary Hong-Kongese-Chinese-Australian visual artist and writer of poetry and fiction. She has published in various literary magazines big or small. She currently lives in South Australia with two sassy fat cats, Puss (in boots) & Pablo (Neruda). She acknowledges that the land on which she stands belongs to the Kaurna people and pays respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.