Introduction by Stanislaw Chadrys and Tiffany Troy

Gavin Cheng’s poems uses humor to process the pressure-cooker academic expectations that shaped him. He begins “Calculate this baby” with “When I’m sitting at this cold, hard desk/ talking the SAT, some thoughts escape/ me. ‘Are those who sneeze a lot the most blessed?'” The world of the imagination–in the moments of peace (in distraction, in playing the game of Monopoly “those Saturday mornings” are short-lived) even while pointing to the speaker’s desire for proximity, and a desire to feel ENOUGH.

Calculate this Baby

When I’m sitting at this cold, hard desk
taking the SAT, some thoughts escape
me. “Are those who sneeze a lot the most blessed?”

before ringing myself back in to the math
wiggling around on my screen
like a cry for help.

My calculator is taunting me with all
different symbols, begging me to
understand. Yet it just doesn’t happen.
Maybe I need a break.

I take a trip down my brain’s
rabbit hole into nothingness. You know
what people always say? The richest people
never did well in school.

Words flow like a river that creeps into a
big and beautiful ocean. Numbers are the big,
ugly dam in the way of that path. Blocking all the
little fish that are trying to be part of something bigger.

Rage ignites me to focus back up again. The dam
is present for a reason. Maybe the reason is hidden
in variables—why x keeps running away. y do i have to
do this at all?

It still doesn’t work. My mind drifts off,
wandering to places no Standarized
Aptitude Test can measure. Stories I have to
tell and all that I have to say.

I finally know why the dams are there.
Rivers need
a little challenge every so often. 

A Time Away

I remember those Saturday mornings
when we would rise
at the crack of dawn to
build imaginary houses and
hand out fake money like
masters of our own world.

We would never finish the game,
yet it still happened like clockwork
every week. I wonder if you still remember
those simple times.

Those times when I would move my piece
while you were distracted. Properties bought
and hotels sprung to life. But it has all began
to fall.

Do you recognize the laughter
dying in fraying threads?
Can you see the base starting
to tremble?

While I am away for hours on end,
you crawl further away,
stuck on opposite sides of a labyrinth
and unable to find our way back.

I know that we have both began to sprout
but do a sister and brother have to
lose their bond? Before it shatters completely,
how can it be repaired?

When the clock approaches zero,
we will look back feel the weight of
all those fateful Saturdays. Take
a picture because that’s the best
it’s gonna get.

Unlace Those Shoes

He came out of nowhere and knocked me
to the ground. There was a thump but the whistle did
not blow.

Keep going.
Get up.
You can’t complain.
Fight for every loose ball.
Fight for every last scrap.

It’s what my Ah Ma used to tell me. We have to
work for everything because nothing is given. I
could hear her familiar accent, always talking about
how hard she worked to come to America.

Ai ya Gavin, when I was younger I had
to walk 3 miles to go to school. You watch Iphone
all time and Dad drive you to school.

I came out of nowhere and knocked him
to the ground. There was a thump but the whistle
blew.

Stop now.
Sit on the bench.
You did something wrong.
Not fighting hard enough for the ball.
Not fighting hard enough for the scraps.

It’s what my Ah Ma tells me now. Be as
perfect as you can because that’s
the only chance you are going to have. I can
hear her reassuring yet stern tone, always talking
about how she survived in America.

Zhicheng, you compete against so many other
people like you. I own restaurant, can’t go to college.
But you can get Ivy.

Suddenly the gym lights feel too bright.
I’m not doing ENOUGH.

*

Gavin Cheng is a junior at Stuyvesant High School in New York City, whose lifelong love for books has inspired him to pursue creative writing of all different genres. As a basketball player himself, he is passionate about sports equity and how gambling intersects with professional sports. Through Writing to Make Change, he hopes to use writing as a tool to spread awareness about these issues. In his free time, he serves as the Vice President of the Stuyvesant Fishing Club, an organization that provides veterans with opportunities to go on fully funded fishing trips.