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Perhaps what I miss most,
meu amor, is the way your eyes would glimmer
in the guiding light of my Winchester. These marbles forced
into your skull are a poor excuse for the deathly precision
of your iris at the edge of a barrel. Your beauty a bullet
not even lamplight could catch, though I would spend
the rest of this eternal sleep galloping after it,
if only to catch a glimpse of the darkness
in your pupils.

But what is there to catch?
For even in death I have never left your side.
You sound as if you were some macaco
courting flames as they dance a xaxado
but you of all people should know
the cost of singed palm
and empty fist.

I know of but one cost and that is you, bela.
To be by your side in this place is little more than a cruel joke
when once I had given you a sertão as your wedding ring
and a caatinga as your bridal price. What love
is there to be bought here with our lips empty
and our necks sewn like a purse?

Had not this tongue been taken
I would sing you the songs of our memory.
Let you listen to the sweet tones of glory
as they serenade the ghosts of our adversaries
like a shrill Lugar’s whistle.

Tell me, what glory is there in a headless man?
Whose body rots while all above the neck persists
only for the amusement of those passing by? Do you not see
how they mock us with outstretched arm and bucktoothed smile?
How they call us criminal? There is no remembrance
of our deeds. Only the bloated excess
of our deformed features.

It is true that these bodies
are ephemeral, but is there not power in a man
who resists long after his final breath has slowed?
Our names echo through the ridges of a Serra do Araripe down
through all the saints’ isles. What is loyalty worth in life
if you cannot capture their hearts in death?

Hearts are only worth as much
as the coronel’s nickel or as much credit as lead can buy.
Is that not what my father learned when his credit came due?
Is that not how we found ourselves cangaceiros, a band of debtors
who refused to pay by the rules they enslaved us with?
Yet, even now we seem to pay with each daily
repetition of this grotesque performance.

And what greater reverence for a cangaceiro is there?
To crucify yourself at the hands of Judas
so that the legend of your defiance can ring true.
If you cannot rest peacefully with that
do you even know what it is
you died for?



Woody Dismukes is a Brazilian-American poet and author living in Jackson Heights, Queens. He is a 2018 Clarion West graduate and has taught at University Settlement’s Creative Center. His work is featured in Huizache, Lightspeed, Apex, and elsewhere. You can find him on Twitter @WoodyDismukes or on his website woodydismukes.com.
Current Issue
29 May 2023

We are touched and encouraged to see an overwhelming response from writers from the Sino diaspora as well as BIPOC creators in various parts of the world. And such diverse and daring takes of wuxia and xianxia, from contemporary to the far reaches of space!
By: L Chan
The air was redolent with machine oil; rich and unctuous, and synthesised alcohol, sharper than a knife on the tongue.
“Leaping Crane don’t want me to tell you this,” Poppy continued, “but I’m the most dangerous thing in the West. We’ll get you to your brother safe before you know it.”
Many eons ago, when the first dawn broke over the newborn mortal world, the children of the Heavenly Realm assembled at the Golden Sky Palace.
Winter storm: lightning flashes old ghosts on my blade.
transplanted from your temple and missing the persimmons in bloom
immigrant daughters dodge sharp barbs thrown in ambush 十面埋伏 from all directions
Many trans and marginalised people in our world can do the exact same things that everyone else has done to overcome challenges and find happiness, only for others to come in and do what they want as Ren Woxing did, and probably, when asked why, they would simply say Xiang Wentian: to ask the heavens. And perhaps we the readers, who are told this story from Linghu Chong’s point of view, should do more to question the actions of people before blindly following along to cause harm.
Before the Occupation, righteousness might have meant taking overt stands against the distant invaders of their ancestral homelands through donating money, labour, or expertise to Chinese wartime efforts. Yet during the Occupation, such behaviour would get one killed or suspected of treason; one might find it better to remain discreet and fade into the background, or leave for safer shores. Could one uphold justice and righteousness quietly, subtly, and effectively within such a world of harshness and deprivation?
Issue 22 May 2023
Issue 15 May 2023
Issue 8 May 2023
Issue 1 May 2023
Issue 24 Apr 2023
Issue 17 Apr 2023
Issue 10 Apr 2023
Issue 3 Apr 2023
Issue 27 Mar 2023
Issue 20 Mar 2023
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