while reading a pale-faced activist’s

book on civil disobedience

I encounter the passage of

that time he evaded Johnny Law 

by hiding with his buddies


in Yellow Face onstage,

the “wrong side of Murder Creek”

I think how activism, like feminism

 often fails people, like that time

175,000 protestors armed with

pussy hats marched through 

the International District on the eve

before the Lunar New Year,

without giving the community notice

ahead of time, never considering how

they’d close streets, affect traffic,

or impact business on what would 

usually be the busiest weekend

of the year, even Uwajimaya

seeing a drop in sales

Shin Yu Pai is Poet in Residence for September.

Shin Yu Pai will be appearing at the following events in September: the 13th, at Cascadia Magazine's Evening of Words + Ideas, the 14th at PACT 2019, and the 22nd at the Black Dog Cafe in Snoqualmie.