The season of decay. Baby seedlings hang on their last breaths, darkening under the branches of a pine tree. The air smells of 奶奶’s worn-out coat, thirty years heavy of dust and dough. You sleep on grass and cling to the stickiness. Your nails peel, flake onto thick grime. And layers and layers of semicircles. Pinecones waiting to soften. When they rot, 奶奶 hides her heart in a hollow.
*
You dream about a body before you understand the body. The body and a face. The face and a teardrop flowing from the right corner of the eye, sliding diagonally as if 奶奶 is lying down on her side. The teardrop passes through a steep nasal mountain, plunging onto the lip. There, the teardrop dries in the sun.
*
Stay still. Still. Still, 奶奶 walks in rest notes. The leaves are still and their sways are muffled. A symphony in silence, a ceasing day. All movement sharp to halt. Then, the voice of a morning bird projects an unsettling shakiness. You mistake it for a crow and it flies away.
*
Change comes in scalene triangles, but music moves in perfect circles. Music travels over a stack of sympathy cards for 奶奶 found in a Walmart discount aisle and bobbles above memorial pebbles born by the riverbank. Everyone is still except a waterdrop. Then another. The storm begins in pianissimo staccato notes.
*
In this house, music is never followed by applause. Music is not even allowed. You make sure 奶奶 never hears you humming under the bed or dancing in the closet. You remember one day you sing in the kitchen without knowing 奶奶 is cooking steamed buns. She mistakes your voice with the running sink water.
*
Outside is dark, windows shut, the piano untouched. With the rainfall as your metronome, your nails tap the piano keys, both hands shaking in harmony. Steam rises from the vibration. The house lights up in violet violin strings. Music within every wall. Somewhere skies away, 奶奶 is breathing. You hear her. As the thunder bellows, you play your first note. You play until everything is in utero.
*
Three hundred tree rings—
Robin shell cracking in shade,
Turquoise in the nest.
Translations
奶奶 (Nǎinai) – Grandma
Pianissimo – Musical term for “very soft”
This poem first appeared in the 2024 YoungArts Anthology.
—
Chelsea Zhu is a teen writer and environmental advocate from Maryland. Chelsea loves summer, stargazing, and skiing.
