Embody written by Gaurav Lalsinghani illustration by Carmen Ngo, layout by Shay Suban CW: verbal abuse/slurs, eating disorder When I look in the mirror, I see a brown, battered shield. A body that has lost all concept of privacy and safety. A carcass that has endured. I can trace the creases of my brown skin, outlines of past bruises, and my protruding rib cage with my fingertips. I don’t know how to call this shell home. I have detached myself from the day-to-day pain that comes with living as a queer person of color. I have rejected these two identities vehemently for the majority of my life, trying and failing to outrun and erase parts of myself that I have known to be true. With my skin color and sexuality both at the margins, I have done everything in my power to
avoid embracing my existence. It was all I ever knew how to do. Growing up, everything around me conditioned me to believe that being brown was wrong. Within the world of whiteness that is Texas suburbia, I was taught, both explicitly and implicitly, the diminished value of my culture and faith. I remember being affirmed for selecting peach and cream-colored crayons when depicting my family in grade school. My life at home became a showand-tell on my peers terms. Hand-picked to regale stories of our parents’ “arranged marriages” in high school, my brown classmates and I were constantly reminded that we were not only “other”, but less than. I stomached the fact that students and teachers alike approached me in hopes of proselytizing me, informing that my religion was “going to die out” and reinforcing the idea that my faith was a “mythology” in their eyes. I could tell that my complete racial and religious presence wasn’t wanted. At home, the smell of incense sticks and sounds of mantras shrouded the shame and guilt I held for myself. Within my own community, I remember the gupshup (gossip) surrounding the manner in which I befriended girls and embraced femininity. I had my male friends reenact Bollywood movies with me as I stepped into the role of the damsel in distress. When I looked for cues of affirmation from those around me, I found nothing. Instead of finding acceptance, I found solitude. The heat and embarrassment that came with the stares of uncles and aunties instilled in me the idea that I was doing something wrong. I couldn’t
