The Queen's Gambit by Matthew Zhao

I’m thinking about killing myself again

I tell my best friend while we play chess

because I know we think the same things,

like after missing a call, worried you had gone

in search of a better home.

I was hoping you’d found a family who

didn’t withhold their love or tell their friends

how disappointing we were.

We begged for Yu Gi Oh cards

instead of learning Go or martial arts.

Do you remember our sleepovers

and feigning sleep to play games?

Keep mashing B! while the Poké Ball quivers.

Shh, I think I hear footsteps.

It’s 3AM and homework awaits in the morning,

but if I stop God will incinerate me and my family.

When we play the penis game,

I can’t shout penis any louder because

I am afraid to be gay, it would all go away,

the security from parents, acts of service

their only love language and above all else,

what would they say?

I’m asking you to make the decision.

I’m asking you to hold my pain.

I’ll follow you always.

You’re my king. Take reign.

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MATTHEW ZHAO is a poet from Michigan, now a PhD student at Florida State University and an Assistant Editor of Poetry at Southeast Review. He was a finalist in the National Poetry Series and Mississippi Review Prize, and a semifinalist in the Longleaf Press Book Prize, Autumn House Press Poetry Prize, and others. His poems recently appear in swamp pink, Four Way Review, The Indianapolis Review, PRISM international, Pinch, The Louisville Review, and elsewhere.