Blanket by Yuxing Xia
Tender and intimate, this piece recalls the layered history of a century-old blanket. Bearing both scars and stains, the fabric becomes a vessel for memory: a shield in childhood games, a comfort in cold nights, and a thread carrying the grandmother's calm voice across generations. The poem is a quiet elegy to resilience, warmth, and the echoes of love that endure through time.

I removed a few loose hairs
from the century-old blanket,

still intact besides several battle scars
and unexpected juice spills.

I wrapped it around my exposed thighs
and remembered nights of using it

as an impenetrable knight shield
or torturous whip for my sisters.

I held it tighter to my chest, and I can
still feel the calm voice of my grandmother

echo through its porous threads:
Listen, child, listen.

Yuxing Xia.