Miss Hong Kong, I’ll Always Love You

We land in Hong Kong, and the first present
my mom receives from her best friend is a tabloid.

Miss Hong Kong 1974’s on the cover,
her botched plastic surgery and Botox showing

how life’s a forever pageant—and I think about
how buying someone a tabloid is like buying

someone a nightgown or a pair of boy shorts
or toilet paper when you know they’re out

or a gift card to a chain restaurant—you’d better
be damn close or dating for at least three months,

but back to Miss Hong Kong: I look at her
looking at a photo of herself as a twenty-something

during her short-lived singing career,
performing in a wedding dress as hot men dressed

as waiters come up behind her, trying to steal her
attention with flowers or chocolates or coupons

for walks on the beach, but Miss Hong Kong,
I’d throw those flowers out because they make me sneeze,

and I’d nix the romance on the beach because
the sand tickles my feet, but I’ll devour your whole box

of truffles or caramels—why are we even reminiscing?
Just go to a five-star in central and the world’s hottest

waiters will be lining up just to take your order,
and Miss Hong Kong, I’ll love you forever, but please

eat the men like dim sum and throw out that goddamn
wedding gown. White’s really not your color.