Afterlives
Winner of the 2026 Tennessee Williams & New Orleans Literary Festival Poetry contest.
~ by Tianyu Yi
At Dinosaur Land, the White Women Love Me
After rejecting another dinosaur-themed wedding request,
Glenda and Stacy smile at me like they mean it.
They're ringing up my $15 Brontosaurus snow globe;
they want me to stick around among the gift shop
Confederate flags and 99¢ fireworks.
Stacy jokes to me about all the times she's been scammed,
how she might have a drinking problem,
how girls wear their skirts too short these days.
It's the kind of warmth I only earn when I pass.
Stacy tells me they keep barbed wire around the theme park
to prevent another "Jurassic Park situation". I know
how their church would save me. I buy
a second "VELOCIRAPTOR" nail file because
“I don’t want to fight my partner for custody”. Experience
tells me they love divorce humor.
I care about them. Nearby,
a governor kills some trans kids. A mother
loses her family farm. A doe
collapses in the heat. A town
ends. Glenda tells me
about the miniature train museum
she grew up next to, how she went home last year
and traced its buried tracks in the Dollar General.
I tell her about my childhood congregation in Arkansas,
about each pew of their proud eyes, shining
when I sang for Christmas and Chinese New Year.
I don’t say how much I miss them,
how I left quiet and feared.
Outside, the sign by the megalosaurus tells me to
imagine extinction
To-Do List for The Next World
Celebrate birthdays— —the dearest ghosts
of a teen girl who mastered the love letters of others
whose jeweler eyes chiseled each line a crystal soul
even her bullies bartering flour for their odes
of a rascal who palmed footballs shamelessly into goals,
earning forgiveness with her crooked smile
her dreamworked kneeslide
even her cruelest brother imagining her potential
of a newborn famed for his ridiculous name
his impossible birth quilted by a hundredth prayer
his full head of moonlit hair
of his father
seeing his father’s vermillion eyes open again
of two boys, unbearably beautiful in each other’s minds
who traded tears to the sea
as currency for a country, a salt-cradled promise
of their mothers
who would have learned to be better
with the company of a sister
of a town’s ancient flirt,
whose palms grew eighty-eight years of dates
their heirloom taste the open secret
of fifty grandmothers’ legendary ma’amoul
each a reminder of a proposal customized over decades
of the thousand nephews and nieces
plotting his coming century over midnight meetings
stashing balloons where even he might not know
be their consequence, their remnant.
hagar’s command
after Lucille Clifton thank you for the days i spent.
here in your desert.
with my baby boy.
emptied of life.
cut from your creator eye.
i offer.
what blessings you have given me.
my body: nothing but.
this harbor of.
others’ thirst for.
a son. made from.
you.
sarah's.
spit.
prayers.
over centuries.
that night she spread myrrh.
across my face.
in her bed, she prepared me.
for abraham. his prophecy.
treated wounds she herself had.
inflicted on me. your whim.
wrought by his hand.
i know now.
you were there all along.
i bore it for ishmael. this child.
breathless from your power.
still.
your eye. mad, ever-spinning.
as a promise. a slave
mother. i.
alone can name you.
know you.
El Roi.
the one who sees.
speak with me now.
return him.
return my son
ado’s choice
wicked sodom, my wicked home
wicked barber for my wicked head
wicked mason of my wicked home
wicked midwife to my wicked daughter
wicked teacher from my wicked girlhood
wicked cat for my wicked mice
wicked grove of our wicked olives
wicked father of my wicked joy
wicked well for our wicked throats
wicked prayers over wicked food
wicked kitchen of my wicked grandmother
wicked breath of our wicked lives
wicked land of our wicked love
wicked mother, my wicked ruby
wicked sky that wicked droned
forget the wicked
my wicked niece, my wicked grief
her wicked hands, her brimstone feet
wicked witness i will not be
i choose the salt of our wicked sea
Tianyu Yi
Tianyu Yi was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, and graduated from Davidson College. She graduated in 2023 from the NYU MFA in Creative Writing Program, where she was the Wiley K. Birkhofer Fellow. Her work can be found in The Missouri Review, The Mississippi Review, and The Vassar Review. She is now studying Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine in Brooklyn, NY.
Notes from Skye Jackson
Afterlives is a startling collection of poetry that reminds us of the classic adage: things aren’t always what they seem. In the poem, “At Dinosaur Land, the White Women Love Me,” we meet a speaker who realizes that the only reason that they are able to connect with the white women at a theme park is because of their mistaken perception that she is like them – another cis woman. The poet uses vivid imagery to show us that identity is always the elephant in the room – whether we realize it or not. In another standout piece in the collection, the poet plays homage to Lucille Clifton in their contemplation of Hagar and the nature of her sacrifice by skillfully utilizing the contrapuntal form to light up the biblical tale in a fresh and exciting way. The poet ends with a haunting and telling reimagining of Sodom & Gomorrah, from the perspective of the woman who was turned into a pillar of salt for glancing back at her “wicked” former home as the city burns. This poet’s talent shines throughout the collection, arresting readers from beginning to end.