Ruiyan Zhu

On the Swing

Beneath the oak trees, two shadows braid
the wind into loops, tails threading through
the chain’s rusted rungs, rattling the red-
chipped tanbark to christen each
a mouthful of dusk. On the swing, I slide
the chapped seat into a dipped saddle, wrestle
the plastic shell until it holds my hips.
My toes curl into the earth, digging
until I spring my limbs toward the sky
and free my mother’s hair-tie: lace ringed
four times around a fist of hair. My shoelaces, waving
untethered, two banners fluttering like white flags
in the wind. With each swing forward, the air pulses
with a heartbeat. I draw a pendulum with my body
across the park’s twilight spine. I pump my legs, hoping
to draw out my mother’s laugh, like the one
she framed behind the handprint on the kitchen wall,
or the one tucked inside the crumpled paper bag
of pruned apricots, still singing with sweetness.
On the swing, I move: forward and back, forward
and back, swinging and rocking, waving and
turning, printed onto the evening like a mother’s kiss.
On the swing, the watch sand beckons the whistle
of the freight train. I imagine it delivering me each night
to spring, ruddy with softness. On the swing, I imagine it
carrying me to a place ripe with succulent joy, hurled into the sky
like a question. On the swing, the horizon smudges
the line between dusk and night. Then, I fall back to the earth.

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Ruiyan Zhu is a high school senior from Saratoga, California who currently serves as the editor-in-chief of her school newspaper and literary magazine. Her work has been recognized by JUST POETRY!!! and the National Scholastic Art & Writing Awards.