SINGLE GAY UNCLE Single Gay Uncle, he thinks, looking at the drink in his hand. That’s what I’ll call this. —Alexander Chee
In an Old Soul glass, add one part what you think You should like and one part what you do like, One part the person you hope you are, one part The person you are. Muddle. Add a dash of bitters. And another. And another. Add that night you sat Next to the one other Asian at another all white Williamsburg bar and she could barely look at you, Trying to shake you off like some butthead brother As she split sweet potato fries and talked parallel Parking with the cute white lesbian next to her. Add the tattoo of a target on the slope of her chest That said HAPPY in the bull’s-eye. Add the Korean Characters on her inner wrist that you could say But not understand, until she deigned to explain They meant day by day, she lived her life day by day, You see, as if the philosophy were better in Korean, add Kimchi and kalbi and gochujang and you could make A cooking poem out of this and dedicate it to your mother. Add the afternoon in the backseat of mom’s minivan On the way home from tennis when she asked you, Point blank, if you were gay, because you’d never had A girlfriend and seemed sad and lonely all the time. Maybe the lack of a girlfriend was a reason, maybe The all-boys school where you got taunted as bowlegged Didn’t help, maybe the fact you spent your weekends Studying for the SAT made things worse, but sure, Diagnose the problem as gayness, she might as well Prepare you for an America where everyone assumed You were gay or effectively so, brushing your cock aside, Especially if you were neat, slim, well-dressed and Wrote poetry. Add the night you kissed a blonde Former Miss Austin (supposedly) in the bathroom Jason Koo
3 Meserole St, #30, Brooklyn, NY 11206
jasonykoo@gmail.com
718-374-1953
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At your friend’s 40th birthday party shortly after She invited you into said bathroom to (it turns out) Watch her pee, you thought she wanted to make out But then you watched her pee, acting casual, then You did make out and this had to be a coup in the history Of the subjugation of Asian American men’s sexuality. But after you emerged triumphant from the bathroom And chatted with your friends in the kitchen and one Took a picture of you and Miss Austin, she grabbed The phone and flushed it where her pee had gone Because she thought it had naked pictures of her, Apparently this was an ongoing problem for Austin In the state of Texas, and so you couldn’t celebrate The coup because you had to make peace, conferencing With her in the master bedroom where, rather than Some loony makeup sex starting, she said she thought You were gay, she only trusted you in the bathroom Because you were gay, i.e. Asian, oh you knew she was not What you should like but what you did, all the men At the party did even as they made fun of her for being Insane and you by association, now the story was How you’d gotten your friend’s phone flushed down The toilet for whatever you did to make this girl go Batshit cray in the bathroom. Add the party years later In Houston where your friends laughed over the story, Their laughter laced with resentment, as if they’d Never forgiven you for having gotten so lucky, at least You got to taste what you did like a single gay time. Add enough bitters? The rocks should be there Already. Stir until chilled, until the glass says uncle, Until you don’t know how you feel about you anymore.
Jason Koo
3 Meserole St, #30, Brooklyn, NY 11206
jasonykoo@gmail.com
718-374-1953