Jill Chan



The World Is Bigger


It is best not to judge.
Everyone believes in their own version
of reality.
One person's inadequacy
is another's impatience.
Sometimes it is insurmountable
even to know
a name, a country.
Impossible to tell the difference
between a name
and the way we know it.
A country?
Well, we live in the same country
but don't realise it.
The world is bigger
for the ways it disregards
its inhabitants.
The bombs everywhere inside us,
finding reasons
for us to stay
peaceful, alone, stateless.



Jill Chan is a poet, fiction writer, and editor based in Auckland, New Zealand. Her poems and stories have been published in MiPOesias, Blue Fifth Review, foam:e, Mascara Literary Review, Every Writer's Resource, Asia and Pacific Writers Network, Otoliths, Eclectica, Snorkel, Broadsheet, JAAM, Poetry New Zealand, Takahe, Deep South, Trout, Denver Syntax, The Tower Journal, Metazen, A-Minor, 52\250 A Year of Flash and other magazines. She is the author of The Art of It: Three Novellas (2011), and five books of poetry: On Love: a poem sequence (2011); Early Work: Poems 2000-2007 (2011); These Hands Are Not Ours (ESAW, 2009), winner of the Earl of Seacliff Poetry Prize; Becoming Someone Who Isn’t (ESAW, 2007); and The Smell of Oranges (ESAW, 2003). She is one of the poets featured in the New Zealand Poetry Sound Archive. Official website: http://www.jill-chan.com
 
 
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