asian american
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My mom came here twenty years ago
She came from malaysia with little to show
She barely spoke english
She watched her fears diminish
I am a mango in frozen salad
Frost covers us all, 'till we're cold to the core
and mangos taste funky in a salad
Exported to the motherland, alone
I am a mango inside a blender
When I was seven I thought the worst thing in my world
was not that my parents fought and my mother hit.
It was that my older sister was kicked out of the white deli
she was doing a project on Poland
When I was 6, I was told to wear my scariest costume for Halloween day at school
And for once, my parents wanted to spoil me,
So while everyone at school became witches or skeletons or furries
ABCs
I remember when I first learned my ABCs.
A stands for apple
B stands for bird
How could you think racism doesn't apply to me?
who told you that my Caucasian parents are my omission
from the
jokes about my feature
stereotypical accusations
and
For a very long time I looked down on myself
for pursuing my dreams instead of the wealth
My brother, an engineer
My sister, a nurse
And I...
I am...
not the lawyer you wanted to see
fun fact: the daughters of the south asian diaspora have some of the highest suicide rates in the united states of america.
I've walked through these halls countless times before now, yet why can't I feel safe?I've been here a thousand times before, yet why do I still feel like running away?
A Banana
The names they called me
When I acted white
Even though I’m Asian
Haha
The sound I made
When I remembered
That I’m ¼ White anyways
Hapa
Not quite the right mix
When my family came to America
we became models
me
the model at school
4.0's and perfect scores and musical talent
my father
the model at work
Growing up, I had my pick fromThe Big Four of respectable careers for AsiansBusiness, Law, Engineering, and MedicineI chose to be a doctorBut I realized I disliked scienceSo I changed my mind
Asian-American immigrant
Born in the East, thrown to the West
My best was all I could give
For the past five years I've accumulated fears
Fistfuls of tears that fill the tank in which I'm drowning
I.
Where do the days go
When a mind smooths itself above
The rippling bubble
Aimlessly resting
Unaware of the big pop.
Where will the days go?
II.
Old
