Family (for Xiaoyao Yin)

1.

Loud thumps were more than company,

front door as thin as any.

Mum walked across the noise to see —

each thump enlarge to many.

Then clumps of feet clacked on our floors,

with yaps demanding logins

To access Falun data stores

they’d claw into like dog bins.

Though Falun Dafa’s in my head,

deep set, assimilated,

I hid my books inside my bed

away from those who hated.

That night my China heart fell dead.

My trust was confiscated.

2.

My mother is exceptional,

her parents had scant schooling

Yet she was near the pinnacle

of academic ruling

Before the persecution fell,

before the mad negation

Of Falun Dafa’s moral swell

that moved the Chinese nation.

They rubber-stamped her ‘criminal’,

they clanged her body tightly,

They boiled her meals to minimal,

her sleep to hardly nightly

But could not block her golden spell,

her Dafa soul shines brightly.

3.

My dad was one with Falun Gong.

Then came the Persecution.

Confusion followed deep and long.

No help. No restitution.

Relentless harassing grew tough

from tv, papers, neighbours.

Worn down, he found faith not enough

to shift the Party’s labours.

It’s like Forbearance shrank and died

in Evil unforgiving.

He bent, he broke, he stepped aside.

He’s somewhere else and living.

The space between us far and wide,

the Evil unforgiving.

4.

My stepdad’s lost. All’s awkward, new.

As though he’s lopped his purpose.

In China, there was lots he’d do.

Out here he’s odd, a surplus.

He bumped the state technology,

cut right through blocks, diced danger,

Was locked up by the C.C.P..

But here he’s just a stranger.

His English conversation’s crude

so he earns basic wages

In Chinese kitchens, there preps food,

repairs his life in stages,

Continuing what he’s pursued,

the Truth passed down through ages.

5.

I’m now a Scottish refugee.

I helped my parents’ safety.

My ease with English kept us free,

a calmer, breathing family.

A family of practitioners,

of Falun Gong adherents

Who still face cultivation’s stress

but safe from Party vehemence.

Because we all are refugees,

Earth’s placements brim with longing

And, as we build identities,

we feel the Cosmos thronging.

We meld with Dafa entities,

with deep, secure belonging.

Xiaoyao Yin and her family fled China in 2018 in order to escape religious persecution from the Chinese Communist Party and sought asylum in the UK. The family practise Falun Gong, a religion which has been targeted by Chinese authorities since 1999. An interview with Xiaoyao is available here: www.tcs.cam.ac.uk/from-china-to-scotland-an-exclusive-interview-with-a-political-refugee