C. J. Anderson-Wu – A Famous Fatherless Child
i.
After his self-immolation, people looked at her with pity or scorn—
The daughter of a martyr, or a radical agitator.
She became the most famous fatherless child in the country,
A symbol of loss, self-sacrifice, and defiance against state violence.
Shall we wait a little longer? Perhaps things will change with time,
So you can spend more time with us?
Her mother had asked her father, who resolved to confront the regime,
To challenge its brutal oppression of voices through extreme means.
Things won’t change unless I act, he said.
If everyone waits for change, it will never come.
When the TV news showed flames blooming from his office windows,
She knew he was gone.
ii.
In the wake of your death, Father, an untethered world began to rise,
Expelled by grief, fears no longer silence us.
Every spring, when the official commemoration
Concludes in April rain,
White lilies stand straight upon the grass
Where you were laid to rest,
Testifying to the free air you’ve earned
For a newborn society.
iii.
Yet she kept asking, all her life, as a fatherless child:
Shall we wait a little longer,
So you might have had more time to spend with us?
Now she comes to the age when his time stopped,
Crow’s feet climbing over her eyes,
The image of an aged father
Emerges.