Chinese Candied Walnuts 琥珀核桃
by Emerald Liu
The inside of your mouth
gleams the way pomegranate seeds do
and I cannot resist to
taste or touch its softness
which is present even in the moss green
of your irises
Stay
even if it’s only for an hour
Stay
even if your presence is reduced
to a memory
reappearing unexpectedly in the
earthy sweetness of walnuts
stored in their shell for nearly a year
gathered along the riverbank
the autumn before you moved away
capturing the joy of us
in their patina
october 26th, 2021Emerald Liu is a Sino-Belgian writer who has previously written for The Millions, Drawing Matter, Far-Near, and more.
Her poetry has been featured or is forthcoming in Verses Magazine, Superfroot, Forget Me Not Press, and Poetry Pacific.
She is currently the Poetry + Prose editor at Asians In The Arts. Her chapbook Double Happiness is forthcoming with birdbeakbeast press this November.