Poems

The Purpose of Rooms

by Leslie Lum

The light different
            from outside
falls deviously to the left
            forced by space,
cramped like a stranger
among old friends.

                  It is familiar:
sunset.
            Is this a sleeping
                        room?

Objectless
            except a body strewn
            here and there
but even it
            is not
            an object.

            Tomorrow your voice
            becomes a document.

Today you determine
            your proportion of importance
            in this room.

Here you are
stretched end to end
your face
            carefully turned up towards
            the light.

Is this not
a living room?

This poem originally appeared in Canadian Literature #163 (Winter 1999), Asian Canadian Writing. (pg. 92)