My City, My Love

An elegy for my home city – Hong Kong. It contains fragmented memories in an amalgamation, like a pyroclastic igneous rock, or perhaps a breccia. Either way, they are organic, sincere, and raw. A work by Abby Lu

My City, My Love.

Hong Kong.

I like to run my hands through tomatoes, stacked in yellow plastic crates under a single hanging lightbulb shaded in red…perhaps getting later chased by the Ah Mah and barraged with Cantonese insults.

You see, it appeals to my Id, or was it Ed? Either way, it’s my alter ego infatuated with the wrong and cheeky.

I like to converse with fishermen still in their canopied boats, in a language of the ocean, a language of humidity and a language of salted fish…perhaps getting side eyes from pedestrians from another place because I am talking to a stranger.

You see, not here. Not in my heart. In the seasides of Hong Kong, our hearts are pristine like condensed milk on white bread.

I like to close my eyes in a bustling tea building, playing a background music of clanging porcelain stained at the edge with soy sauce…perhaps getting splashes of brown milk tea on my freshly ironed shirt.

You see, I don’t mind. The brown flower gives the white a certain flair. Here, nobody’s too good for each other. Stains here and there tells me you are human.

I like to run along the beach, on a prickly mixture of leaves, shells, fallen fruit, and sand while opening my mouth like a whale shark, savoring the warm salty air that is for the most part, water…perhaps ending up with a battered and cut body.

You see, it satisfies me. My body might be worn, but my heart is refreshed.

I like to…reminisce about you, you are so far away from me now.

You see, this is what it is like to belong somewhere, and have that place belong right back to you.

Sincerely,

A.L

About the Author:
Abby Lu
See About page.