Bound Feet, by Kelsea Yu, is teochew png kueh & guavas. Under a rich and silver moonlight, planchettes of teochew png kueh line the Chinese garden floors like forbidden footprints. Pink like your cheeks, patterned like your vivid thoughts. An abundance of savoury flavors wait inside these delicate dumplings. They nearly burst at the touch— full of peanuts, garlic, shallots, and crunchy fried rice. Farther away, scattered after these, all the way to the bridge, we leave plump green guavas. One breaks, an accident, I know, and the tart juice oozes from its peel, trickling over the bridge and into the water below. Koi fish bob and feast on the sweet, pink liquid that spreads like blood, and how was I to know what would happen? How was I to know what these offerings might do? And how was I to stop myself? The veil between the living and dead is food. We have left these offerings for you. Fuzzy envy bubbles from my gut as I look at her body, that swollen belly. She leaves these things too, but it is not the same. She is not as wrapped up in this hungry dance as you and I. We are forever bound up together, bound feet in one single, small shoe. I will take you from the night. Because inevitably, the food rots. It hears us, smells us, feels us. The guavas roll, toward me, toward us, insidious in their leakage. The png kueh ruptures and spills forth its sludge, coats our feet in its slime. This food will consume us, become us, until we decide. We must be selfish in our pride.