Gising

Steffi Tad-y

 

 

 

I can’t remember
if it were barbed wire 

or bits of beer glass
the bougainvillea towered over, 

or an orange boomerang
then a scar under my eye. 

One day, I want to retire
from seeing only the spectacle. 

Live long enough
to grow with my hands. 

Press one’s fingers into the dirt.
Gather beans. Make of it a warm bowl. 

Feed my child.    
Muscle a cramped road. 

This is my signal. Today, I will celebrate.
Here is a grandfather 

in a bucket hat,
bobbing to Purple Rain.  

Sunflowers from Sxótsaqel
spring out of his car window. 

A basset hound says hello.  
Earlier, my nephew had a thread 

around his two milk teeth.
His mother by the door. 

I wish you were there to see him.
The way he said wow. 

In our language, to wake up
rhymes with blessing.

The sun is
beginning to line my irises. 

My niece, how she sings
Baby Shark. 

What else can I tell you?
Let us go. 

There is side-street parking.
The ticket machine 

looks like a pair of binoculars
across an orchid mural. 

Coat & keys are on the table.
I’ve been late all this time.

 

 

 

Steffi Tad-y is a poet and writer from Manila. Her latest chapbook, Merienda, was published by Rahila’s Ghost Press in 2021. She lives in Vancouver, B.C., in the territories of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam Nations. 

Unfinished Duplex

Steffi Tad-y

After Jericho Brown



I was scared being angry meant being unloveable.
Angry I had nowhere to put it down.

Anger, where do I put you down?
The Tagalog word for pomegranate is granada.

Having eaten what I can’t detonate, I agonize.
I agonize over gut flora while taking pictures.

I take pictures of magnolia, plum, &  bougainvillea.
The trees detonate magnolia, plum, & bougainvillea.

I was a child of an explosion after explosion.
Without a camera, my cousin saw an explosion.

What does it mean to witness an explosion? Carry it home? 
I was scared being angry meant being unlovable.





Steffi Tad-y is a Filipina writer based in Vancouver, B.C., in the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, & Tsleil-Waututh nations. Her first poetry chapbook was published by Frog Hollow Press in 2019. To watch the Toronto Raptors play live is part of her bucket list. One of her current and pressing goals is to write a funny poem.

Train : a journal of carefully-considered re-emergence

Issue #9 : Julian Day Jason Heroux Charlene Kwiatkowski David Ly David Martin Emilia Morgan Steffi Tad-y

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Julian Day lives in Winnipeg. His work has recently appeared in Juniper and Ghost City Review, and his debut chapbook will be published by Anstruther Press in early 2021.

Jason Heroux is currently the Poet Laureate for the city of Kingston, Ontario. His most recent book is the novel Amusement Park of Constant Sorrow (Mansfield Press, 2018).

Charlene Kwiatkowski is a writer living in Vancouver. Her poetry has been published in PRISM international, Barren Magazine, Long Exposure, and Open to Interpretation. Her fiction has appeared in Maisonneuve and Ottawa Arts Review. Charlene was runner-up in Pulp Literature's 2020 Magpie Award for Poetry for a sonnet anticipating the birth of her first child. She holds a Master's degree in English Literature from the University of Victoria and works at a contemporary art gallery. textingthecity.wordpress.com

David Ly is the author of Mythical Man (Anstruther Books, 2020) and the chapbook Stubble Burn (Anstruther Press, 2018). His writing has appeared in carte blanche, The Maynard, PRISM international, Plentitude, The /tƐmz/ Review, and others. He is the Poetry Editor of This Magazine and a member of Anstruther Press' Editorial Collective. Twitter: @dlylyly.

David Martin works as a literacy instructor in Calgary and as an organizer for the Single Onion Poetry Series. His first collection, Tar Swan (NeWest Press, 2018), was a finalist for the Raymond Souster Award and the City of Calgary W. O. Mitchell Book Prize. David’s work has been awarded the CBC Poetry Prize, shortlisted for the Vallum Award for Poetry and PRISM international’s poetry contest, and has appeared in numerous journals across Canada.

Emilia Morgan is a Palestinian-Canadian writer and co-founder of Coven Editions small press. Her long poem Suburbia was published as a tiny book in by In/Words press, and you can find more work in Bywords, talking about strawberries, Chaudiere, and some other places. She is a member of the Arc Poetry Magazine board and otherwise spends as much time as possible with plants and animals.

Steffi Tad-y is a Filipina writer based in Vancouver, B.C., in the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, & Tsleil-Waututh nations. Her first poetry chapbook was published by Frog Hollow Press in 2019. To watch the Toronto Raptors play live is part of her bucket list. One of her current and pressing goals is to write a funny poem.

Personal Archive

Steffi Tad-y

After Joanne Arnott

I placed years of work inside a word cloud
generator in an attempt to sift through
a record of racing thoughts I prefer
as rain on my rubber boots, small & wet,
I can shake off by the door beside a mop
& a red bucket. The words in large serif
a constellation on the screen: woman, want,
trees, arms, home, called, look, enough.
You may lose face, but what happens
& grows in you is what gives you a vision.
This morning shade once auburn has now
marooned. A cul-de-sac to park sunsets.
Woman. Want. Trees. Arms. Home. Called.
Look. Enough. Each full stop unspooling
the cardinal & bluebird privacy of things.



Steffi Tad-y is a Filipina writer based in Vancouver, B.C., in the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, & Tsleil-Waututh nations. Her first poetry chapbook was published by Frog Hollow Press in 2019. To watch the Toronto Raptors play live is part of her bucket list. One of her current and pressing goals is to write a funny poem.