There’s something strangely satisfying 
about small mouthfuls wrapped in dough. 
They come in so many varieties: ravioli, 
jiozi, pelmeni, kreplach, wontons, 
mantu, and knishes. In the mood for 
something slightly larger? There’s 
empanadas or calzone, dosas, crepes. 
Baked, steamed, boiled, or fried, folded 
in triangles or gathered into purses. 
I think about them when I’m standing 
on my head in morning yoga classes, 
imagining a dim sum cart laden with 
small plates. No one can tell us what’s 
inside. We have to take a bite to find 
that out. The fillings might be plain, 
and yet the wrappers make them 
special, whether they’re dressed in 
dipping sauce or floating in a broth. 
Once folded, like a letter in an envelope 
and fancy stamp, topped with a silver 
cloche, it’s a delight to scoop them up 
with chopsticks, slippery as fish, dredge 
them in a saucer of black vinegar and oil, 
to bite into a xiaolongbao, savoring 
the soup inside, or shatter the crisp exterior
of cha gao or samosa, burning the tender 
tips of all my fingers, my lips and tongue. 
                        

As a kid, all I ever wanted to do was read—
school got in the way. They read so slowly there, 
and always about boring Dick and Jane or other 
wholesome books, approved for their sunny 
outlook, not the dark fantasies that I preferred. 
I was bad at gym and math, stood embarrassed 
at the board with only the wrong answers 
in my head. In high school, college counselors 
said I was not bright enough for college, 
should drop out, become a secretary. 
To make my mother happy, I took typing. 
I didn’t mind because my handwriting 
was awful, and anyway, it was a good skill 
for a writer. My father left school at 14 
to get a job, wanted me to work with him 
at the factory, twisting tiny wires and soldering 
transistors into patterns on a circuit board. 
That was the last thing I would ever want to do.
 So I kept on taking classes, would not quit, 
kept on racking up degrees, till I’d gone as far 
as I could go and stood up at the board, 
with all the answers I would ever need.