Ronnie McGinn's Poetry Page

Tammy Ho Lai-Ming is a Hong Kong-born writer currently based in London, UK. She edited Hong Kong U Writing: An Anthology (2006) and co-edited Love & Lust (2008). Formerly, she also served as poetry editor for Word Salad Poetry Magazine and Sotto Voce Magazine.

Tammy has presented papers in Auckland (New Zealand), Hong Kong (China), Krakow (Poland), Lancaster (UK), London (UK), Middelburg (the Netherlands), Osaka (Japan) and Singapore and has published academic articles on Victorian literature.

Between September 2005 and August 2008, Tammy worked as a demonstrator at the School of English, the University of Hong Kong.

At King's College London, Tammy continues to help organize events, including a cross-disciplinary discussion series entitled Creative King's (Spring 2009).

She is a founding co-editor of Cha: An Asian Literary Journal. More at www.sighming.com

Your Silhouette Is Blasphemous

I have made a fatal bargain with the devil.
If I say to the moment: you are beautiful,
stay, stay a while, then I'm doomed.
Condemned to hell for eternal days.

I shall seek solitude.
I shall shake the dust of this man
off my nude feet with much alacrity.
I shall kill no tree for our secluded image.
I shall ignore his calling me his goddess.
I shall drink his unsubdued rage
but not be drowned.
I - shan't - want - time - to - stop.

But woe is the minute I meet the blasphemer.
He proves in mind's pupils all his reflections
are but miniatures, baser shadows.
I want to etch his live silhouette, imperial,
forever in my mind. Forever canonized.

But dusk arrives, children wail.
Dry leaves flung far outside the window.
Such a fine line between day and night.
I have not yet finished my masterpiece!
"Please, sunlight, stay a while," I plead.

© Tammy Ho Lai-Ming