Forward
by Keon Woong Lee

Dark Tendrils lick the heavy air
Father grips hard before letting go

…………Paperbird will carry my words, just wait
…………Mother, stick to the shadows

Soon

Stinks and stains and slow and

Commands and crowds and care and

Prode and pick and passport

Stamp

Packaged, Poised, Plopped

To misfamiliar places
With unorientating smells
And non-grounding sights

Distress wave

…………Back table
…………Back table
…………Box
…………Existence box
…………Box

Inviting gestures

…………Existence box
…………with flash horns
…………and steam suckers
…………and fruit cupboards
…………and mandatory pet

Existence box, sweet existence box

Shhhh

Morning, Map, Mission

Hunting for renumeration

City cones
And
Cloud lanes
And
Rotary tickets
The city stretches

From air travel capillaries to its industrial heart
A density of histories
Bodies tense with memories

Histories of carnage
tunnels, eruptions, giants, gas, angularities, shedding, drifting
Marching
Drumming
Running
Stumping
Stumping on mud, dirt and ashes
Away from the dark tendrils
Away from the iron giants
Away from the vanishing

…………We are all etched before we escape

The city sighs

Misfamiliar misentertainment
Mind-numbing minute movements
Meagre messages in months

…………Miss you

Let the sun unfurl towards the moment of reunion

Keon Woong Lee is a playwright, theatre director and General Manager of Faust International Youth Theatre Hong Kong. His credits include original theatrical adaptations of Alice in Wonderland, Pinocchio, Journey to the West, and Pride & Prejudice. He also created original stories such as Rosaline, the Kip Marlowe Detective Series, Modern Teenage Fables, and many more for Faust. Other highlights include performing the lead role of David Henry Hwang in the Asian Premiere of Yellow Face in 2013, directing the opening event for the Hong Kong Literary Festival 2009 and giving speeches for ESF Chairman’s Award for Academic Excellence Ceremony and a TEDx event at Shatin College during 2018-19.