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LIN ZHAO — SPITTOON

spittoonlitmag.com · 6,117 words · saved by 1 readers

Suppose trees could really pin down a space (rhododendrons for Salt Water Town, cotton rose—fog-shrouded cities, camphors—tropical islands), or a person (the Buddha as a bodhi, Huan Wen as a willow, Zhang Zao as a plum blossom tree). Then they would also definitely be able to reify a moment in time. Different trees have me pinned to different pages in the script, versions of myself for two hands to press, dry, classify, and store away. Typhoon moments are oil palms. The interregnum between school bells for classes ending and classes starting is the fishtail palm. Before turning fourteen, I was the white sandalwood. Not the lilytree or the southern magnolia, but rather the purely Southeast Asian Magnolia x alba—with a green knife-edge carving a wide courtyard out from the world, lifting it upward, like those unchanging birthday nights with their serrated blades propping up a corner of cake year after year. White sandalwoods in military formation, making a fairy ring, containing between

LIN ZHAO TREES translated by Jesse Young and Xiao Yue Shan Suppose trees could really pin down a space (rhododendrons for Salt Water Town, cotton rose — fog-shrouded cities, camphors—tropical islands), or a person (the Buddha as a bodhi, Huan Wen as a willow, Zhang Zao as a plum blossom tree). Then they would also definitely be able to reify a moment in time. Different trees have me pinned to different pages in the script, versions of myself for two hands to press, dry, classify, and store away. Typhoon moments are oil palms . The interregnum between school bells for classes ending and classes

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