Saturday Poetry – ‘Wonder Wheel’ by Wo Chan
Saturday Poetry – ‘Wonder Wheel’ by Wo Chan
This week’s Saturday Poetry, matched with mobile photography/art is entitled ‘Wonder Wheel’ by Wo Chan. Wo Chan is a poet and drag performer. Their book, Togetherness (Nightboat Books, 2022), was the winner of the 2020 Nightboat Poetry Prize. Chan expressed “I wrote this poem for my dear friend, Hye Yun Park, in the spirit of summer: of beaches and Coney Island Ferris wheels, of sunsets and seafood pancakes, and of friendships—the mystery and wonder of it that brings (and keeps) two people close. We had spent, unplanned, two consecutive evenings together, which became the container for this double sonnet. Friday’s dinner and a gazing into Dumbo’s gauzy sunset, then Saturday, a heaven of stage lights through red velvet curtains as we watched Dame Cuchifrita and Edie Nightcrawler’s ‘SATYRICONEY,’ a burlesque tribute to filmmaker Federico Fellini. I think if I could write an entire book like this, a book about my friends’ hearts and feelings and how I see them . . . I would be grateful for all the days.”
I have matched mobile art by @biju_ramankutty with this poem.
If you would like to be featured in our Saturday Poetry section, please ensure you include the hashtag #theappwhisperer to any images posted to Instagram. This will mean we will be able to consider it.
To view the others we have published in this section, go here.
via Poets.org
‘Wonder Wheel’ by Wo Chan
angels undress, & solstice has got us mini, stilled . . .
hot hounds thrash east into ocean’s maribou,
foam that is knowledge, our own gravy bods
veloutine as time is giving. it’s pajeon weather, krill
pink past prime, past memory & vistas futureful.
i saw the backside of my own eyes, great no-god
carousel rouged as nutmeg with blood. the nerve!
i mean it was the nerve. my optics creamy yet thinning,
hair moss in abundance, precise as the meridian.
not even a bird could escape becoming more like a bird.
what is friendship? the same question i asked you returns,
sparkling like a hot fix comet between our minds.
a friend is someone who sits with you, amphibian.
between water & land, a friend sits with you.
& then a curtain opens. a woman reclining shines huge
in absolute tableau. linen, white. skyline, paper. gender,
dame cuchifrita, perfectly still, daring life to blink.
we can’t stop recording this immersive dream. abuse
shook once our early worlds, & this is how we meet.
it is a miracle to be a tube with legs—it is miraculous (!)
to be a coil in a bag . . . a patty in a briefcase! a living necklace!
a two-legged descendant of clear-boned fish! an optimist!
us red-rich bums more royal than crabs predate bliss!
the washer ring oh-shape of time fits us, tilts us
well over sky’s edge where, somehow, air sits gentlest.
crude, blue mesmero, glistening as fresh silk,
—to wet this globe with salt & glee, to unlatch the attic,
to undo the sleeve. we finger most the principle fabric.
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Joanne Carter
Joanne Carter is a British photographer, photography journalist, editor and curator and the founder and editorial director of TheAppWhisperer.com, an independent international photography publication established in 2009.Her journalism, criticism and commentary have appeared in The Times, The Sunday Times, The Guardian, Financial Times, BBC, Vogue Italia, LensCulture, Popular Photography, Android Magazine, NikonPro, DPReview, Which Digital Camera and Which Camera. She has lectured internationally on photography and mobile art, served as a juror for international photography awards, and exhibited her own photographic work across the UK, Europe, South Korea and the United States.Alongside her editorial work, Joanne's photographic and postgraduate research explores death, grief, memory, representation and social inequality through contemporary photography, participatory practice and visual research methods, with the longer-term aim of developing this work through doctoral research.Through TheAppWhisperer, she continues to publish independent photography journalism spanning contemporary photographic practice, mobile imaging, photographic apps, computational photography and emerging imaging technologies.Joanne is available for editorial commissions, photography projects, judging, curatorial work, speaking engagements, consultancy and selected collaborations.
