folding, falling, fading

dinner tonight and every night / chopsticks clenched in tight
fists / knuckles white like raw jasmine rice / wooden ends
scraping china bowls / mouths tied with zongzi strings

her mother swallows words like kuding tea / each
question on her tongue claws back down her
throat / the unsaid ricochets like bullets

the war leads her back to bed / she
pulls out the glass pane / prays
in nothing but leaden bones

cruel dashes stain eyes
like ink / her body
folds and falls

a crumpled
origami
girl

By Sandra Chen

Biography:

I am a rising junior in high school from California. My work has been recognized by the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards and can be found in the Eunoia Review and Moledro Magazine, among others. I have also attended the California State Summer School for the Arts and the Quartz Young Writer’s Workshop.