my sketchbook is trés jalouse because i've neglected her, so i drew.

Edward Hopper Study: "Excursion into Philosophy"

Her shirt is pink like strawberry flavored bubblegum and falls

short of covering her naked rump. Lying in bed with her back

to him, she stares at the hairline crack in the wall and wonders

why the much older man won’t stay

a little longer. Why he always insists on getting up right after

to dress himself, starting with the faded briefs and those off-

white socks. She wishes he were a cocker spaniel that she might

cuddle with all afternoon, have him lick her fingers with his wet,

eager tongue. His sigh makes her shiver, or is it the breeze

coming in from the opened window? Next to her, on the edge

of the bed, where the man now sits fully clothed, is the book

he has been reading, splayed out like an afterthought:

Plato’s Symposium. The crease of the spine between the pages

reminds him of the two round cheeks of her buttocks, and he

begins to contemplate those Ideal Spheres, the way the light

lovingly kisses their Divine Form, before willing himself to think

beyond the immediacy of their physical beauty, riding her

curves that seem to stretch across the threadbare sheets like the

hills outside, or the postcard sky above the green-gold grass.

He looks down at his foot, caught in between the dark shadows in

the room and the finite rectangle of sunlight spilled across

the floor. He waits for the exact moment when he hears her breath

grow heavier, and feels the weight of her body slacken. In her

dreams, he will walk slowly out of the house and into the fields

like a boy again, ready for the first hunt.

the girls stick forks in the ground

The girls stick forks in the ground. Recess behind the fence, the girls stick forks stolen from the cafeteria into the ground and water them with chocolate milk as a tribute to the fairies.

The girls in their navy blue pleated jumpers dream of growing breasts and wider hips. The girls hide in an empty classroom after school and play strip rock-paper-scissors with the older, eighth grade boys. One button, two buttons, three buttons undone. They all duck behind the desks as Sister Claire walks by.

The girls stick forks in the ground and read Nancy Drew novels, dog-eared and faded, that they borrow from the library. Over the summer, the girls grow one inch, two inches, three inches taller. They are sent home to their mothers who will let down the hems of the same navy blue jumpers.

Forks in the ground, in the autumn rain and mud, the girls stick metal forks that never grow despite all the chocolate milk and love. The bell rings in the morning, and the girls sit down at their desks in neat little rows, reciting Hail Mary Blessed Mother of God, Fruit of thy Womb pray for us Sinners, Amen, with clenched fists.

One girl sticks the fork deeper into the ground than the rest of the girls. So deep the fork barely shows and she drives it all the way down with the heel of her scuffed, patent leather mary janes. This one shall go to hell first and survive to tell the story:

“Petals on a wet, black bough,” thank you Ezra Pound. Petals on a wet, black bough, the girls stick forks in the ground. One fork, two forks, three forks deep. Metal crocuses buried beneath the snow, burning bright like a spark of love and maybe fairies don’t care too much for chocolate milk, who knows.

Girls who trudge the same mud-splattered mary janes up the stairs and down the blue-gray halls of the school that smell like piss. They imagine what it’s like to be kissed by Scott or James or Kevin in 206, and if it’s anything like kissing the inside of their own arm with a pillow crushed between their legs on a Sunday night, “studying” photo-SYN-thesis.

The girls stick forks in the ground and wear gym shorts underneath their navy blue jumpers. The girls stick forks in the ground behind the yellow school bus. Pick blood red hibiscus flowers from the bush, dance and whoop and lift their skirts, and dare one another to eat the earth.

The Other Sister

The shops on Bedford Avenue glowed in the afternoon sunlight, as the hipsters emerged from the shadows of cafés to smoke their cigarettes in the abiding heat of summer. Business was slow, but we had just opened two weeks ago and were now competing with the myriad of nail salons that seemed to pop up overnight on our street.

As far as I could tell, during my first six months in the country, Asian immigrants dominated three local industries: restaurants, dry cleaners and nail salons. It didn’t matter if you were Chinese, Japanese, or Korean, you would inevitably end up at one of these places. I was here with six other girls from the mainland. We were all working under the watchful eye of Mae, a dough-faced, middle-aged woman from Shanghai whose husband owned the business, though she was the one who kept the books and managed the storefront.

Mae had a large black mole on her right eyebrow with hairs growing on it, which she claimed was a sign of prosperity and wealth. I watched her now as she counted the green dollar bills in the cash register, sucking her teeth and inadvertently reaching up now and then to rub that hideous mole of hers, as if it were the fat golden belly of the Buddha making all her money dreams come true.

I looked out the window again to stare at the leggy American girls in their skintight jeans and ripped stockings. They seemed to glide languidly down the sun-drenched avenue, until I lowered my gaze upon their enormous feet. Any illusion of grace and beauty shattered in an instant. Those legs that seemed to stretch on to the heavens were cut off abruptly by the sight of large flip flops, slapping against the pavement like clown shoes or diving flippers. Up close and bare, the feet were even uglier; long and bony with toes that curled under like claws and chipped polish that barely concealed the dirt and grime buried beneath the nails.

A young woman in her early twenties like me walked into the salon. I pointed to the display case of OPI bottles of polish, and then scrutinized her face as she spent a century deciding on a color. In my broken English, I tried to push “Pink-ing of You” on her, but she settled on “Cha-Ching Cherry” – a bright red polish that in my opinion looked cheap and a color only loose women would wear back home. She was Chinese. I could tell by her striking features, though she was one of those wealthy second-generation types who were born in the U.S. and grew up drinking Coca-Cola and watching American sitcoms.

I clipped her toenails and she gave me the smile you give if you’re the type of person who feels embarrassed by the fact that you’re paying a stranger to touch your feet. I asked her if she spoke Mandarin, then watched her face shift from embarrassment to fear to pity, after which she said, “Yes I do, and where are you from?” As if to say, I really do care about my sisters from across the pacific, with a lingering element of we are not the same but I can’t erase you from my consciousness, and I said, I’m from Suzhou and my name is Shirley Wong.

Ode to My Eyebrow Pencil

Almay 02 Brunette: The only brow defining pencil

I can count on. Not too light, not too dark. No red-brown tint

that contradicts my natural coloring. Smudging kept to a minimal

extent (save on hot summer days in the city when the makeup

melts right off your face as you wait to board a crowded train).

Sure it's not sweat proof or water resistant, but what more can a girl

ask for? Perfect brows au natural? Here's to freedom

every morning in front of the bathroom mirror: One tragic sweep

like Edith Piaf, or an arch to-die-for like Liz Taylor's Cleopatra.

Better yet, Pretty Baby Brooke Shields with her thick untamed

brows, cutting across her little doll face like two straight arrows.

No more plucking and tweezing. No more Vaseline, rose oil, or other

"homemade remedies" to PROMOTE OVERNIGHT HAIR

GROWTH by 15%! Just a confident artist's hand brandishing her

toilette. Maybe she's not born with it, but generations of women have

worked with what they got: My Taiwanese grandmother tattooed

a pair of tadpole-shaped brows onto her forehead, the color of the ink

now faded from black to blue, but they frame her aging face

nonetheless. Ladies have pinned it down to a science: How close

can a broad get to the Golden Ratio of 1.618? Placing the pencil

vertically against my nose, I determine the start of the brow,

then draw across and down till "X" marks the spot where all three

corners of mouth, nostril and eye line up like some astrological

sign: By night, I am Da Vinci's Mona Lisa with knowing eyes

that gaze out at the rest of the world from beneath a naked mound,

pale moon brow, temple of worship: Tomorrow is another mood.