Dylan Tran

Looking at My Venmo Feed and Getting FOMO

The world folds again,
but I am living on its edges,

where the silence is so deep, nothing
can distract it from ringing in my ears.  

They say you cannot fold
a piece of paper more than seven times.

Curious—I do not try—
I’m merely dust along a papercut. 

Let me mix into your bloodstream
between cycles of reincarnation.

Let me hold you from across
the borders of our imagination. 

Like the way I don’t recognize
the names of my friends’ new friends, 

like the turn of the final page
of a mystery that has no end,

I close my eyes, and I am here,
I open my eyes, and the world

has folded for the eighth time.

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Dylan Tran is a Chinese American poet based in Washington, DC, who strives to uplift the Asian American voice in literature, while walking the fine line between culture and otherness. Dylan received a B.A. in writing seminars from Johns Hopkins University and he is a 2024 Brooklyn Poets Fellow. His poems have appeared in El Portal, The Mid-Atlantic Review, Moonstone Press, Volume Poetry and elsewhere. Outside of writing, Dylan’s interests include public history, anime and tennis.