(Love song, with two goldfish) is a poem written by Grace Chua, it is about the relationship of two goldfishes.

charms hook, line and sinker,” (10-11) this contrast of deep and shallow reflects their love and how their relationship is viewed from different angles, but what can he do he was hooked. The male fish just “float[s]” (2) and “wish[es]” (3) unlike the female fish who “ makes” (8) and “darts” (9), the juxtaposition of their effort and actions explains their failing love, one is passive and the other active. The repetition of  “ fisheye” (6)  further explains the distorted vision of their relationship, he wants her to be content with what they have and wishes she “ sing, not much, just the scales” (4)  however she feels “bounded by round walls”(7) and contained, yet she “swallows/ his charms, hook, line and sinker” (10, 11) showing her acceptance of his desires to “give” (6) and so she “makes”(8). Ironically, their submission to each other is their separation. Chau shows the male fish is “bowled over” (12) and tries to reach to her maturity in the second stanza- “submarine” (15); “deepest” (16); and “dive”(16)- his love for her runs deep yet he is unable to complete her wishes regardless of his efforts. He believes the “ocean”(13) will give them a place to “count the waves” (14) and “share/ their deepest secrets” (15, 16) which still does not appeal to the life she desires because it just no different from home. Chau inserts similes like “diver for pearls/like stars” (16, 17) to represent his inability to provide the life she wants, he gives her pearls because he cannot give her stars, his lover wishes for more than what they have, she's haddock enough of the bowl. The last two stanzas reveal the emotions of the male fish after his lover left him, he realizes their incompatibility is due to the fact she wanted a better life while he just wanted her. The male fish is offishly heartbroken and knows their “love’s since/ gone belly up.” (18, 19), his “heart sinks” (19 and “drowns” (21) in depression as he is (trapped in the bowl) while she rises and moves on. Also, the male fish “drinks /like a stone.” (20, 21), revealing his struggle to escape the monotony of this metaphor, but all he can do is “stare emptily through the glass” (22) unable to escape. The male fish is stuck in the bowl but throughout the stanzas parentheses were utilized to show the containment of the fish however on the last stanza the lack of parentheses resemble the female goldfish’s separation from the bowl. The last lines, “a life/beyond the/ (bowl)” (26-29) emphasize the contrast of the lovers’ lifestyle and aspiration: she wanted to live a better life and grow with him but he could not give her what she desired because he only had love to give. The first stanza he said he had “nowhere else to go” (3) and now he has nothing else to give. The poem “(love song, with two goldfish)” represents an extended metaphor depicting a tragic love story of a female goldfish who yearned to live her dreams outside the bowl and a male fish who didn't understand how to cater her dreams. Grace Chua tells the story through metaphors and puns to add depth to the story yet convey it in a lighthearted and silly twist on the failures of human love.