Atlantic City

Blues emerge from the Jersey shore’s
salty spray, spitting white froth on boardwalks
lit up from Atlantic City. I close my eyes to neon
glow and gamblers’ stumbles. When you died,
I could hear reverberations of the weeping
tears that Shah Jehan spilled at the absence of his lover,
howling out from a counterfeit Taj Mahal.
Lying under tattered covers as a child, I never knew how
the miles of weathered wood here would hold
reminders of all we could lose to the restless waters –
recurring spilt sorrow that dampens the cracked planks
we once trampled over.

About The Author

Jean YeoJin Sung was born in Seoul, South Korea and raised in Cherry Hill, NJ. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from Rutgers University – Newark. She received her BA from NYU's Gallatin School where she was awarded the Herbert J. Rubin Award for Poetry and her MPA from NYU's Wagner School of Public Service. She has previously published in Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, Contrary Magazine, The 322 Review, and Salome. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.