qarrtsiluni

by Jee Leong Koh

When asked your place or my place, meaning host or guest,
I always choose to travel and become a guest.

The good hosts in The Odyssey throw a great feast
while fantasies are grateful answers from the guest.

The prof is buying his first house in New Hope.
He has invited me to be his weekend guest.

A beautiful book about ugly people, you wrote.
I see the beauty first because I am Nick Guest.

You are so right to fear my suitors for your love.
I will consume your house. I am the constant guest.

There are house rules for a vacation orgasm.
After I play the host, I want to play the guest.

Sometimes Jee is Odysseus, sometimes Penelope.
The Indo-European root makes us host and guest.

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Jee Leong Koh is the author of two books of poems, Payday Loans and Equal to the Earth (Bench Press). His poems have appeared in Best New Poets (University of Virginia Press) and Best Gay Poetry (A Midsummer’s Night Press), and in LA Review, Drunken Boat and PN Review, among other journals. Born in Singapore, he lives in New York City, and blogs at Song of a Reformed Headhunter.

by Jee Leong Koh

So soft his neck, so distant from the thought of stone,
I am appalled to see it pass into a stone.

That night swam for so long and slipped out of my hands.
Tonight it is as clear as fossil in the stone.

I come from a small country of large alterations,
where stone erects no memory for passing stone.

Somebody is fucking somebody in a corner.
Everybody juts as if released from stone.

Why have you come to kill this mutant, strong young man?
Hack off my head, and I will still turn flesh to stone.

There is a slippery slope in things that lie down flat.
In all coming and going speeds there is a stone.

He is not dead, I tell you, he is merely sleeping.
The rest of you move back. Jee, roll away the stone.

Download the podcast

Jee Leong Koh is the author of two books of poems, Payday Loans and Equal to the Earth (Bench Press). His poems have appeared in Best New Poets (University of Virginia Press) and Best Gay Poetry (A Midsummer’s Night Press), and in LA Review, Drunken Boat and PN Review, among other journals. Born in Singapore, he lives in New York City, and blogs at Song of a Reformed Headhunter.