Flinch & Air

Laura Jane Lee

• Publisher: Out Spoken Press
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781838427221
• Topic: Letteratura
• Subtopic: Poesia

Flinch & Air is a unique exploration of Asian female identity. Reflecting on culture, politics, language and society in and beyond Hong Kong, this is a book of remembrance, courage, resilience and sacrifice. Touching on the current Hong Kong mass demonstrations, the 2019 Extradition Treaty, and the stories of her female elders Flinch & Air positions Asian women at the centre of the page.

Part I: 女也 ta

Tang Chu Ching 鄧珠清
(por-por 婆婆)

Tang was born in 1936, in a small farming

village of Doumen District, Zhuhai in

Guangdong Province, China. Born to a family of

farmers, Tang was the third child and only girl

in a family of four children. Tang had a relatively

happy childhood, though poor, with a father

who doted on her and was ahead of his time in

recognizing daughters as equals to sons. They were

largely unaffected by the Cultural Revolution as

they were of the working class, but there were

certain unfortunate events such as the accidental

death of her sister at a very young age. At around

20, Tang left the village. She first faked illness and

cited the pursuit of a cure in heading southwards,

then, under the guise of marriage to a Stateside

relative known only by a smart passport photo,

made her way to Hong Kong, where she courted

many suitors but settled on a sailor. Why she did,

I cannot guess. From her I inherited mischief and

vanity.

These are some of her stories.

my lover was a sailor boy

absence is the thing

that catches in the netting,

(when he would come back to me

smelling of brine and sea legs)

the thing

slippery and breathing,

(learning the sprawling vastness of the

heart, the one that is)

alive

undressed waiting

punctuating our

children

(clings to pining skeletons,

bathes the high days between rain)

blooming giddy every

season and again

yes

bold for love’s

shivering,

(tossing

dry of the ocean’s light,)

i resolve to the daily

wake, to high tide in empty

(bed, knowing my lover leans

in for a bent kiss on the cusp of)

land and

fluttering sea.

wee darling

wee darling,

that strangled night when the moth-black

rained with hushed

men-shouts, and high-strung the lightning

roughed our

little mud-hut,

you, wee

thing, how you slept whilst

creatures rang whinnying in the hollow-

weather, when mid-harvest our little boat

flipped like a fish-wish

in the storm-wash eve so

ma upped-and-went in the slurry

after pa, leaving us a flurry-bleed of

slum-thunder.

was just us, wee

one, you and me — you

snug as a bug to the moon-curve

of my small girl-spine

(ma left strapped ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Part I: 女也 ta
• Part II: 我 ngo
• Part III: mothering the land
• Acknowledgements
• Other titles by Out-Spoken Press