"A Film About a Main Character Making Love" by Dorothy Chan
A Film About a Main Character Making Love
Poetry is sneaking off with a great lover Into the bushes of a ritzy Los Angeles Home, transporting you to climax — sex Serves as the coming-of-age rebellion In this interlude of orchestral movements. Consider: the best part of the act could Be getting caught, spurring jealousy from The onlooker. Voyeur taking a voyage Into the unknown territory of cuck chairs And oh, how our main character used to Hold onto hotel keycards for sentimental Reasons. Shots of afternoon rendezvous Against the West Coast sun, tongues licked, How a college education teaches passion When the Italian couple approaches her, Their politeness on the sheets when Husband Watches Wife eat out our lead. Poetry dives Into the getaway car — the last time you’ll see The greatest love of your life against casino Lights, how rivers and mountains and oceans Away limit us to the ninety-minute runtime. In the bushes of the LA home, our lead thinks About Andrew McCarthy, in his prime damn, Giggling with Jami Gertz as the young lovers Rekindle their romance, delivering interlude From the main story of the film. Is romance The distraction or the end game? There’s no Better generational question. Now flashback To our lead as a little girl throwing baby dolls On the floors of toy stores, her father hoping She’d pick one up. Fathers wish the wrong Things for their daughters, and other lessons. Poetry becomes the home. Our lead grows up Taking on domestically challenged as viable Personality trait. Armor? She ponders how Main characters do not settle down if they Want to remain compelling, how Hollywood Neatly bows up the domestication, the settling With unworthy love interest turned life partner. Amour? In the bushes of the ritzy Los Angeles Home, our lead feels interlude as the characters Inside eat their poached pears, sip on their wine.
Audio: Dorothy Chan reads “A Film About a Main Character Making Love”
Photo Credit: Joshua David Watson
Dorothy Chan is the author of five poetry collections, including Return of the Chinese Femme (Deep Vellum Publishing, 2024), BABE (Diode Editions, 2021), Revenge of the Asian Woman (Diode Editions, 2019), Attack of the Fifty-Foot Centerfold (Spork Press, 2018), and the chapbook Chinatown Sonnets (New Delta Review, 2017). They are an Associate Professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.