The Venomous

Abstract

The Venomous Pandora (bio) Translated from Burmese by ko ko thett I get delicateEach time I shed my skinDon't you dare thinkI am softIf I change colorsI only want to adaptTo the shifting sandTo the strange watersI am not the type thatFlaunts my neck hoodFor hissing and missing. My wink can smolderMy stare can hypnotizeMy bite can snatch a flyMy head lying low doesn't meanI'm asleep. Clear your own pathCurl up in your own holeWatch yourselfIf you don't know anythingJust coil up and be quietDon't you try to invokeMy recessive traits Next timeI won't just rattle. [End Page 227] Pandora Pandora is a Burmese poet, essayist, and blogger. She has published two anthologies of Burmese women's poetry, the first of their kind in Myanmar. Her poems have been anthologized in Bones Will Crow: 15 Contemporary Burmese Poets (2012), and translations of her work have been published in Asymptote, Poetry Review, and Sampsonia Way. She currently works for the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore. Ko Ko Thett ko ko thett is a bilingual poet and author of several collections of poetry and poetry translations in Burmese and English. He has been featured at literary events from Sharjah to Shanghai, and his poems and translations have appeared in literary journals and anthologies worldwide. He was the poetry editor for Mekong Review from 2017 to 2022. His most recent volume is Bamboophobia (Zephyr, 2022). He lives in Norwich, U.K. Copyright © 2022 University of Hawai'i Press