i took a 5AM flight to Disappointment
regret was the only thing i felt
nestled within my broken heartstrings as i watched
the parched roofs of Texas stretch into
a vast expanse of nothingness
beneath me and my luxurious cubic square foot of flight space
pondering just what my grandparents would say
when i emerged on the broad steps of Kaifeng and Fujian
bearing a Chinese tongue riddled with spotty holes of
American speak
i imagine i’d strain to look them in the eye
for i hate to see my own shame reflected
in my grandma’s speckled irises
to see my shame settled in the corners of her wrinkled mouth
the same one that taught me my first Mandarin words
i know
the reason i’d return my relatives’ ni hao’s
with hello’s
the reason Asian cuisine
fights to feel a sense of familiarity in my mouth
the reason my chattering cousins call me shy
for never speaking
when it’s really because i can't piece two words together
in their language that supposed
to be mine
i know the reason disguises itself among the folds
of my persona
that deep down for a long time
i have been ashamed
of the country i called my home before
the land of the free
somewhere in me i trace
broken bits of images from
the third grade
punctured laughs & mockery
bottomless stomachs & emptied thermos
sardonic sneers as they follow my gaze to the garbage
where my six pristinely wrapped xiao long bao’s lie
among half eaten tuna sandwiches and dirty apple cores
the fruits of hours of my mother’s labor
she was so eager to have me taste
but i never was able to touch
i disinter images of the school bathroom
where i bent over the squealing faucet and picked
at the skin marked an indubitable yellow
i carved my pain into the
sculpture of my being
am i nothing more to you than a color?
in America, my mother recounts narratives
of her broken English
i laugh and help her recite
corn and cone
ship and sheep
so that Nancy on the phone won’t tell her to
“learn English better” the next time
she orders a pizza
but here, it’s my mother murmuring translations
in my ear as i stutter over jiān guǒ and jié guǒ
chǎn zi and tǎn zi
frustration clouds my mind as i
struggle to retain
the whispers of a language i silenced so long ago
and the few silvers i cling on to now
i promise
i am proud of my culture
but is my culture still proud of me?
fog pillows over the parched city i now call home
i touch my fingers to the chilled glass
and breathe my regret to a land over the sea that i cast away
somewhere down the airplane aisle comes the brassy
jingle of the trolley
bearing its familiar contents
i wonder if Nai Nai has had orange Fanta before
somehow i doubt it