Fluff Rain

On Sunday, it felt like catkins exploded across the city, covering us in pollen fallout.

If you’re in Beijing, please consider attending my reading this Saturday at 3 p.m. at The Hutong. I’ll share mostly new poems from the past (very eventful) year-plus.

In the 1980s, to combat desertification, Beijing planted thousands of trees known for their robust growth. Unfortunately, one unintended consequence was a proliferation of catkins, which release pollen that blankets the city every spring.

Fluff Rain

Opened my door to a cotton tornado,
seed hairs swirling up my nose.
It’s flocculent in Beijing this evening,
the notorious trees shedding pollen
in heat, eager to satisfy what biology
insists. We take it in. We shimmer
through the spring snow, white fuzz,
cycle against airy eiderdown, face
arboreal discharge with mouths shut.
We breathe only in exhales, look up
until the flufflets disappear against
the backlight of a penetrative sunset.

Poplar cotton