Yuan Changming, nine-time Pushcart and two-time Best of the Net nominee, published monographs on translation before moving out of China. With a Canadian PhD in English, Yuan currently edits Poetry Pacific with Allen Yuan in Vancouver; credits include seven chapbooks (including Dark Phantasms [2017]), Best of Best Canadian Poetry:10th Anniv. Ed., BestNewPoemsOnline, Threepenny Review and 1319 across 40 countries.

We/They

We come, we see, we conquer, while
They never seek territorial expansion

          We eat meat with forks and knives
          They chew grass at bamboo sticks

We believe in God and obey the law
They practice Confucianism and follow their superman

          We discover nuclear energy to make great bombs
          They invented gunpowder to celebrate festivals

We punch others with hard fists
They dance around us with taichi gestures

          Our men fuck around everywhere outside our households
          Their women lay babies right in our living rooms

We colonize every city with an English syntax
They decorate each street with Chinese signboards

          We deploy aircraft carriers near their waters and coasts
          They marry girls to our princes and paupers

We enjoy setting fires and blowing winds along their long walls
They have Chinese stomachs to digest all insults and injuries

          We try every dirty way to overthrow their government
          They sell every clean artifact to help our citizens survive

We borrow money from them to build more weapons
They toil to make more money for our banks