THE REALITY OF GHOSTS BY YILIN WANG “Why do so many Asians believe in ghosts?”
she leaves behind on the shelves. Count my
Two white yokai scholars won’t stop gawking
breaths to check whether I’m dreaming.
at us like we’re aliens seen through a telescope.
Each gap between tiny footnotes
They bait our deceased ancestors to rise up
is a signpost for the names left out.
in a parade of their torn robes, already stained
Wild marginalia peeks out from the edges
by the handprints of grave robbers. Demand
of peeling white-out. My transcended kin
elegies to be bottled up for a weighing of
didn’t pass on to have their half-healed scabs
their heaviness, a test of their misty reality.
ripped open again, paper offerings stolen
I must have left my soul in Fengdu Ghost City
like plundered heirlooms, trapped
two summers ago, when I devoured an icy blue
behind spotless display windows
popsicle atop the mountain home of Diyu,
so far away from home. It’s much easier
the Underworld. Perhaps it’s why I see ghosts
to summon spirits than to
everywhere now. In a bookstore,
cast them away. When they are
a Chinese granny has my late Wai-Poh’s
evoked, they’ll return without fanfare,
toothless smiles and stooped shoulders.
and they’ll feast. A hunting of the unreal
I trace the spine of second-hand history
living, a haunting of the faithless.
Previously published in Fantasy Magazine. 22
