After

My grandfather passed away in 2021, and this is the first year I’ve been able to visit his home, my childhood home in Xi’an, China, since his passing. It’s amazing how profoundly a place is shaped by a person. This time, everywhere I looked, I saw reminders of his absence: the empty plant pots outside, his canes behind a door, dust covering a box of his Go pieces. The city itself felt a little emptier, the magic of the place dimmed by the inevitable reality of time and mortality.

My dad told me the story of the pomegranate tree yeye planted in the backyard the year we immigrated to Canada. In Chinese, the word for pomegranate, “shi liu”, can connote staying or remaining. This year, as I went out to the backyard one day, I spotted a shirt under the pomegranate tree, fallen flowers sprinkled upon its chest. I wasn’t sure whose shirt it was, or who put it there, why they put it there, but it reminded me of an image I took a few years ago, of yeye’s shirt hanging out on the line to dry. For a moment, I felt his presence again. 

Featured in PhotoEd Magazine, and Nuit Blanche Toronto 2024.