oneouncegol d
a col l ect i on ofpoems bys ahr a vang nguyen
One Ounce Gold
A collection of poems by Sahra Vang Nguyen
Edited by Miqi Cos
RIOT IN THE SKY | Boston, MA 02136 Copyright © 2012 Sahra Vang Nguyen e-book version Is a copyright page still necessary in this digital day and age? Does “All rights reserved” mean anything anymore? Go ahead, steal this shit! Bootleg it! I can’t keep track. Asking permission would be nice. I wrote this, and the world will know it. This e-book isn’t going to make me rich, anyways. Cover Art, Book Design & Typesetting: Sahra Vang Nguyen The text of this book is set in Adobe Garamond Pro Visit: www.riotinthesky.com
For my parents, whose journey to make everything out of nothing started with one ounce of gold
Life is far from linear and closer to infinity
Table of Contents Stutter
1
Haibun Outliers Greatness Push Sonnet: Alive
5 6 7 9 10
99% Homelessness Change is Coming (2008) Sonnet: Arizona Who will Save Us? Pray for the Gays
12 14 16 18 19 22
Every Ounce Counts 3rd Grade Lost Language Mega Million Mom A Poem for Dad Santa Clause is Not Real Gangsta Momma Green Grass
24 27 28 31 34 37 39 41
Idolize Independent Women Amazing Race For Richmond
44 45 48 49
I.
II.
III.
IV.
So We Give
51
Time Sestina: Apocalypse No Fool’s Haiku Sestina: Fireflies Fear in Becoming
55 56 58 59 61
Acknowledgments
63
V.
Stutter When my mind stutters I start to click around the clutter of my Firefox Jumping from webpage to webpage to avoid all the things My brain is trying to say on the Microsoft page Inception during the day is really the layers of insecurities and inhibitions stopping us from living and loving deeply If we only use 10% of our brain, Then the other 90% is working without our permission The daunting subconscious How much is hidden within ourselves we never knew? How much of our known selves do we deny? What dreams beneath layers of the dormant mind Dwindle in unspoken space and shrivel away with time? Have we let our desires be redefined from heart’s calling to heart’s aching? The waking hour of many is deceptively perceived as the alarm clock When the most alarming thing in our system is seeing So many people sleepwalk through their daily lives Without question or care as to how to stop the clock from running their lives And discover operating life on their own time And their own terms Maybe we can’t change all the rules of this intricately woven system But we can say “fuck the rules” in the meantime to discover what space Has not been hollowed out for us to fill with new meaning Purposeful and gleaming Like black ash buried in the crevices of lost memory The pressure turns dust into diamonds For all the world to revel and admire But nobody gave a shit before our hands became a commodity There’s a dollar sign on everything in this world Even if you don’t believe in it, you are a part of it Capitalism is the only universal practice You might never cash out You don’t even have to buy into it But you should always set a value to your life Before others tell you your worth Value yourself Before others tell you you’re worthless We were born kings and queens and everything in between Only to be dethroned
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One Ounce Gold
When the media said, you will never be me You will never be me You will never be me Until we believed that we were actually trying to be someone else Other than ourselves We forget what becoming looks like When we reject the person in the mirror every day Become a slave to our own image Replace curiosity with a grimace Beat ourselves up for not fitting the fictitious mindfucks Of our twisted imaginations Made possible by paid programming And last night all that champagne went straight to my brain Life fast Die young Our hearts beat faster on the run Gunning for first place Just a chance to taste the riches Of the rainbow When all our lives we’ve been dealt with Black or white This or that Deal or no deal But no one ever told us about the option other Because other was constructed by the Devil To justify the Devil’s prize Incite fear in all the converted And defend traditional institutions of whatever the fuck you say But what about the other other All the non-believers The non-conformers The ones who believe then question Question then believe Believe the scriptures to a certain degree And leave room for the meaning of life in me In you In everything we’ve yet to see Relativity above all sets of normativity If it didn’t come from you
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One Ounce Gold
What a tragic life to live, Waiting on the confirmation of others If only becomes a plague we carry with us To our grave Like untold secrets that eat away at our souls All the could’ve would’ve should’ves Banging on the insides of our walls The ones we threw up to protect from the flood Of fear and avoid crossing over To the other side of our minds The part we coddle behind closed doors Terrified at the risk of being betrayed If we let our fantasies come out to play Or if we accept the challenge Failure becomes possibility to all the possibilities We’ve dreamt up in the safe haven of our hearts Nobody wants to take a shot in the dark Like dodging bullets from the blind side But sometimes life requires you to walk somewhere you’ve never been before Believe something you’ve never seen before Open eyes Open hearts Open mind They say seeing is believing But what about the undiscovered To believe before we can see Like the key and the kite The unfathomable experiment that brought this earth light Benjamin Franklin aimed for the sky and rewired the world
Let your genius unfurl, too many people have told you to wait your turn Whether you’re seeking remission or permission Life’s answers come from asking the right questions Without question let your journey evolve into a new dimension. Nowhere else but the here. The now. The present. Get it.
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One Ounce Gold
I. How much do you see without your eyes?
Haibun I woke up in the middle of the night to sounds of vomit, in the complex above me, another person trying to purge himself to sleep. I pulled my socks up and slipped out the front door to find peace in the velvet solitude, head dropped backwards I count the stars that haven’t been wiped out by city lights yet. So many stars made and destroyed by flashing lights yes. I guess that’s what happens when you feel invisible your whole life, grow up and crave the spotlight. Adorn ourselves with Gold on the outside, shine with Light from the inside
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One Ounce Gold
Outliers They only teach children to fill in bubbles How to pass or fail And become insecure by the measure Of another’s standardized idea Of excellence Every child’s growth is like a chart Staggering lines are alarming Predictability is comforting Track every move Progressively climbing Or consistently plummeting There is a place for everyone In society as long as there are no surprises Even America needs deadbeats To do the shit most Americans don’t want to do And build products in prison But on a graph Where the outliers dance alone The genius and the outcast Look the same
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One Ounce Gold
Greatness You desire greatness Flying off into fantasies About the spotlight sensation And singing your truths In sweet rapture for the people The willing audience is a danger When unreadily met with The responsibility of honest engagement, Though you yearn for the task To lead through rich melody You desire greatness Flying off into fantasies About becoming the next idol Or ambassador to influence The eager in every context Children without role models, Citizens without evidence, Government without integrity, You would fill the gaps With a sincere motivation To strengthen the bond between All human beings You desire greatness Flying off into fantasies About global adulation And the power to free Others from worldly pains Infinite gold chains to Embellish the bodies of The typecast, The impoverished, The underestimated, The neglected, The disposable, The underserved,
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One Ounce Gold
The ones a rapacious culture Failed to properly raise, Insidiously wrapped in shackles For sleepless cycles Finally awakening on the sunrise With the fire of the phoenix You desire greatness To fill the world with an unmatched greatness But there aren’t enough roads on earth That could ever lead you To your destination Every path for every person Is brand new and Defined only by the one Who walks it Right or Wrong Is purely a state of mind Every step is a move in the right Direction if there is full Commitment and belief Behind it In the process of searching For all the right things to say And all the next moves to make So many will forget that Greatness already exists Within So when the excuses run dry And hungry hearts hang heavy The question remains Are you willing to share your gift with the world?
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Push Meritocracy Is it a force or façade? Plow ‘til tomorrow
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Sonnet: Alive Our bodies are matter for the moments Explore depths far past metaphysical Kind hearts and souls are filled with great potence A life and death beyond traditional Thus when we die, do we cease to exist? Our spirits rise, sweet bones beneath the grass Mass melts away, shadows amongst the mist Do we stop talking to the ones of passed? If life today is energy encased Our bodies serve as ticking time capsules Now must we wait ‘til frames turn into waste Before we choose to dance without the rules? We trap ourselves within these tender limbs Death need not come for us to fly at whims
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II. Are you making history or is history making you?
99% The new world is breathing Cracks through the concrete The revolution is teething Like a sleeping giant hungry for the greedy He crawls out of the margins Expose burns of the needy He crawls out of the margins Expose fears of the greedy Like a sleeping giant awakening to stumble Mumbles of his budding conscience Erupt a nation in rumble We are the 99% Becomes the new anthem An army of heavy hearts never danced harder Occupation of the mind will be prequel to delirium When dying kings go out in style, they smile Their last snapshot in history to capture A thousand trials masked behind little white lies And the rest of the world multiplies 10, 20, 40 thousand and counting Cries of the hungry and illiterate are drowning In a sea of rising unemployment And the top 1 percent still question Why people are heavily unsatisfied But we’ve been here before Too many men and women have died in this war Because we’ve seen this before The moment you start demanding more Dominoes start falling Triggers pulled back A counter attack to silence the roar Arms stretched across the world to show his reach Is deeper than the internet Tweeting faster than pepper spray travels Soapboxes arise on everybody’s bloggies To chime in the preaching that the 99% is done sleeping Say hello
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One Ounce Gold
Say hello Say hello To the monster you have created
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One Ounce Gold
Homelessness zombie: noun 1. a person who is or appears lifeless, apathetic or completely unresponsive to their surroundings Sleepwalking through black clouds of exhaust Their bodies are washed out with the cinders of inner city combustion Faces caked with layers of filth until there is no color left in their cheeks The homeless folk of Los Angeles exist by blending into the background They are the most invisible of society because even As they stagger across town like drunken zombies People refuse to acknowledge their existence when It is a taint to the picturesque familiarity of their city The homeless are everywhere Tucked away in the holes of parking lots Claiming their fort on park benches Rolled up like caterpillars never with a chance to emerge Shelters become sleeping bags become sheaths in one We see them in the periphery of our eyes Only to look in the other direction Hold our breaths as we quickly bypass Then exhale in relief as we lock car doors We pretend like we don’t see the breathing body bags underneath the awning We take detours to avoid a remake of Michael Jackson’s Thriller on skid row We walk forward with eyes fixed on a lamppost 10 yards ahead to dismiss open palms We desensitize ourselves to the suffering of another human being Allowing ashy bodies to fade away into forgotten shadows of our own backyard Because to many, the homeless are the hopeless They are already dead While we walk They wander Our lives like clockwork Their lives like a sundial
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One Ounce Gold
We reap reactions They are swept to the margins Over 60 percent of Americans suffer from depression From the crowns of CEOs to the aching joints of street bums A zombie is a person who appears lifeless, apathetic or completely Unresponsive to their surroundings In trying to repel the problem We have become it Whose world do we walk in? Whether we are living in fear Or fearful of the living We are no better than those we spurn when We willingly act ignorant Our humanity like a switch— No consistency, just convenience Will the rest of the world Flip us off When our turn comes to plea For others to recognize our need?
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One Ounce Gold
Change is Coming (2008) Ode to Barack Obama My new black president It’s been a long journey to Washington A destination several centuries and many wars in the making But after every bleeding sunrise for the fighter And fallen stars for the survivor After countless revolutions around the world and back The soular eclipse to black out the White House Illuminate this nation Forge a new path in the stars for our children Has finally arrived. Obama, Are you the face we’ve been waiting to see? Stretched across homemade wheat paste posters to high definition T.V. The portrait of your dream has awakened an American renaissance Where Barack is the new baroque. Obama, Are you the glimmer of hope we’ve been praying for? The flickering of faith to guide us through a post-era of Bushy politics Before we cast ballots we bought t-shirts with your face on them Begging they stay fresh than turn vintage in the case of an election lights out. Obama, Are the words you speak the words we’ve been waiting to hear? The change we want so desperately to believe in Heavy hearts waiting to collapse in the conviction of your promises But like abandoned first loves we hold on tight for fear of being deceived more than once. But Obama, We are still waiting for the ashes from 9/11 to stop falling Twin tower debris fully swept away but we cannot sweep away the violence from our imagination We cannot ignore hate crimes provoked by the media Pumping messages to the mainstream
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One Ounce Gold
To outcast an entire population of people who show features like suicide pilots. And Obama, We are still waiting for the rebirth of New Orleans after Katrina Football stadiums and casinos do not feed the people Flood victims are drowned out by celebrity headlines Every day high hopes fall and the tide continues to rise. Obama, We are still waiting for the recovery state of Operation Iraqi Freedom We are still waiting for a Vietnam War memorial that remembers Vietnamese names We are still waiting for the American government to apologize for Seung-Hui Cho of Virginia Tech We are still waiting for Proposition 8 to be overturned We are still waiting for ICE and the CIA to raid the White House We are still waiting for Guantanamo detainees to be free We are still waiting for the United States prison system to be free We are still waiting for higher education to be free For healthcare to be free For prescription medicine to be free For groceries to be free For wedding vows to ring free For people to live free From fear We, the people, are still waiting to be free We are still waiting And while promises slide off your tongue Hope catches fire in our hearts We are the ones who breathe life into our dreams We flood the streets for progress We march toward every rising sun We are the ones we’ve been waiting for
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One Ounce Gold
Sonnet: Arizona Does Arizona mark a massacre? A budding holocaust against the brown Antagonize the people and teachers To ethnic cleanse and white wash down the town The bigot raids come knocking on your door Blind bullets through the gateways strike the brain They ship breadwinners off the edge of shore And ban the books that hold the people’s pain But some believe we live in colorblind Protect the borders from illegal men And teach the kids to honor our best kind Then make them fear the enemy within These laws reflect the terror of the state Inside democracy they spread the hate
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One Ounce Gold
Who will save us? I’ve heard more people make noise for Charlie Sheen than Libya Celebrate this man’s drug addiction laced with half-baked misogyny Then crucify young men like Chris Brown on his album release date because The image of a violent black male is more comforting than the talented rising star Americans will overthrow themselves Meanwhile CNN headlines take me for a loop around the world Mass Graves in Mexico Suicides in Japan Children Burn in Haiti There is something strangely nauseating about scanning through death tolls on my MacBook Pro while sipping tea from the comfort of my IKEA couch I don’t want to be ignorant of the world Still, I wonder how much of their suffering I am meant to see Is dying sacred anymore? With so many faces grabbing the camera to expose the urgency of their crisis We take for granted how much of their souls they give away Every time they look the world in the eye and say, “I am dying, can’t you see?” Like open wounds vulnerable to vultures They wait Days upon Months upon Countless sunsets Then realize that no one is running to their rescue; Just running to get their story The world can’t help what they don’t know But there is a fine line between learning and exploiting Despite the fact that media frenzy loves to frame the unfortunate as stray animals In a state of perpetual refuge Even victims caught in the heart of tragedy
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One Ounce Gold
With nothing left to hold but each other Still have their humanity So tell me now What is the rate of exchange between hollowing hearts and dire response? If after 10, 20, 90 days you knew your desperate pleas Only hit numb ears Would you still want your death to be televised Like a series finale For viewers who sit, waiting Knowing damn well this episode would eventually come? When information quickly moves from being Sensationalized to desensitizing How much responsibility is upon the consumer to stop indulging Regardless of the relentless barrage of constructed pity tales? Large, solemn eyes in the midst of rubble Beg for the world’s attention To do something more than send heavy sighs and prayers From the comfort of their homes I am guilty of this too Or send minimal effort text donations To appease the moral compass of their minds I am guilty of this too Or worse Call the Red Cross a sham Then refuse to donate at all I am guilty of this too If I stop watching I run the risk of becoming passively uninformed If I keep watching I might become apathetic to the onslaught If I don’t think about it I am no better than the rest Writing poems won’t fix the problem Every moment I spend brewing, Searching for a solution Another person dies Am I wasting time
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One Ounce Gold
Or making time? And meanwhile people around the world Heckle and hate America Stupefied by a nation’s stupidity Who idolize idiots like Charlie Sheen Taking the stage before sold out crowds The perverse gratification to encourage a terminal train wreck Americans have long begun betraying themselves And in the process, How many international faces have been indulging in the decay of America? Watching so many of us kill ourselves from within Or worse Witnessing the walking dead
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One Ounce Gold
Pray for the Gays “We’ll pray for you. God wants you to be straight.” Dinner conversations gone sour Servants of god assume dictatorship over another person’s fate They claim their bodies to be the vessel for God’s voice Relay messages and condemn homosexuality But there is no accountability for their words “Don’t kill the messenger” Is a pitiful excuse for religious brainwashing “I don’t need you to pray for me. Please don’t pray for me.” They pray harder Every non-conformist is in need of saving Holier than thou translates to the wretched are ignorant If it doesn’t fit into their religious doctrine They won’t know how to understand themselves. “Peter, the Devil is in you. We love you. Let us pray for you.” When the channels of communication are not questioned Is the Devil or God speaking? With both eyes closed, they pray. The blind and the faithful look the same How do you save Someone who doesn’t know they need saving?
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One Ounce Gold
III. How much of your life exists in the unspoken?
Every Ounce Counts Every ounce counts When you weigh out the odds Carry the weight of daybreak Invest in stakes for the cause Burden of survival Await heaven’s arrival The thickness of breath in a lifetime to die for Heavyweight dreams slung across slashed shoulders The abandoned city takes arms Families raise soldiers Prepare for the take-over Guerilla warfare emerges Escape a landscape melt away to the ocean Body weight flood the horizon Sea level is rising Fear feeds hunger Beast belly beast widens Hold your weight up At the rim of its mouth Pray you don’t drown Every ounce counts Every ounce counts With aluminum dreams Alternative means for Mom and me To make cream We tore the city up Like a scavenger hunt, Picked apart the trash On our daily walks Throughout the local parks Stroll up and down the blocks Mom—she got that tune for our dumpster diggin’ Theme song for frugal livin’ Her heart’s forever singin’ Collecting cans was a past time for mom and I
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One Ounce Gold
Frequent visits to the liquor store We hoarded Pepsi nuggets Heineken emeralds Trash turned treasure Money by measure Twenty ounce beer bottles Nine ounce of plastic The weight of recycle For five cent deposits We watched the paper flutter ‘til Our eyeballs bounced Packrats for the cheddar Every ounce counts The way every ounce counts When staying afloat Hold every breath to lighten the load The ocean is breathing Waves swallow bodies whole Navigate in wishful sleep Awake— Pray sight curtain calls home Saigon City is crying A galaxy shattered Black ash between fallen stars Flicker supernova combustible matter An anatomy of war and refuge Map destinies in the moonlight Camouflage bodies between banana leaves Stealth in the starlit hour of flight Invisible loading dock Liminal vortex to reimagine home Empty hearts for hope Pockets for trade My mother’s fare passage: One ounce of gold Every ounce counts
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One Ounce Gold
Human cargo to waste Freedom weights Golden anchors on days Bodies overboard A bead of sickness in sweat Turns boat into morgue Tears know no sunset Fears open to flood Waterworks submerge souls Ocean stains mixed with blood Because every ounce counts When you weigh out the odds Carry the weight of daybreak Invest in stakes for the cause Burden of survival Await heaven’s arrival The thickness of breath in a lifetime to die for Heavyweight dreams slung across slashed shoulders The abandoned city takes arms Families raise soldiers Prepare for the take over Guerilla warfare emerges Escape a landscape melt away to the ocean Body weight flood the horizon Sea level is rising Fear feeds hunger Beast belly beast widens Hold your weight up At the rim of its mouth Pray you don’t drown Every ounce counts
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One Ounce Gold
3rd Grade It was lunch box love The way my mom used to separate the soy sauce Because she didn’t want my rice to get soggy by noon Saran wrap ran around individual spring rolls locking in the freshness Plastic cups, tin foil, and rubber bands became makeshift peanut sauce containers Vietnamese leftovers made my elementary school day meals Bitter melon soup, salty fried fish, and fluorescent yellow curry duked it out with PB&J, bologna sandwiches and Lunchable Brand Pizza in the lunch room It was the ugly duckling meets food network I cringed to crack open the Tupperwear Unleash an ancestral aroma Several generations in the making A questionable confrontation riding up the nostrils of everyone around me Foul like striking the wrong chord Plucking at nose hairs It was too much exposure of the difference in me I wanted to shut the lid tight Seal off my Americanism Convince my mom that I seriously wanted those Mysteriously spongey chicken strips of shit From the cafeteria instead Just to wash down my nasty lie with a carton of artificial chocolate milk Dosed with shame Snack time was dominated by the hegemony of fancy brands Little Debbie was sweet But could she compete with General Mills, Hostess and Nabisco? Store brand snacks were all I could reach for off the shelves Mom stocked up on savings but I couldn’t afford the humiliation Flap & Fold plastic bags were all I had to show for my ego Because Ziplock bags were a luxury If only I could show off the shiny blue and yellow seal That interlocked to make green in the mix Maybe the other kids would believe I could blend in Just as well
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One Ounce Gold
Lost language How does love get lost Within the same language Even in our native tongue We strike and miss each other like stray bullets Are we doing something wrong here? It’s not enough that we mean the same things Love, money, men, money We are defined by Different worlds Different time zones Different wars There is no definition, just perspective For you Fear is escaping political persecution at eighteen Sneaking sips of breath under the midnight cloak Dodging rifles in the mud And praying the pacific beast will carry you to land before the boat drowns in its own horror For me Fear is silverfish licking my body in sleep, Running out of ideas Confronting crossroads And failing at my dreams that are privilege to pursue You can never understand my desire to chase fantasies Because you never had the luxury of doing the same A youth stripped away By the violence of guerilla warfare An adulthood consumed By the burden of surviving In an alien nation Like orphans of the world Seeking refuge in the land of the free
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One Ounce Gold
Without enough time in the day To wipe the dripping sweat off your face You fixed shoes and washed dirty laundry So that slowly, step by step Stack by stack You came closer to liberating yourself from the tireless clock For you Freedom does not come from dreaming Freedom comes from eating, And sleeping And affording deep breaths of reflection in between Every motion for the money feeds a family overseas And makes space in the future for Your children to have the opportunity of Growing up in America Can you honestly say We were your only dream? We both want the same things The best But for you the best Is living a life without the risk of starvation Or heartache of poverty For you Money has proven to serve the best The careers that bring the most capital Will ease the anxiety of your children suffering Freedom from pain is the best you can want for me For me Money cannot begin to define my best It will be a means but by far the end goal My pursuit of happiness Feels so naive When you look at me like that My pain is knowing that you never got the chance to do the same
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One Ounce Gold
To explore your best outside the context of bare necessity And outside the context of me I climbed the ivory towers collecting gold lanyards You carved a freedom trail in the Pacific Ocean I read Malcolm X, Noam Chomsky and Jared Diamond You said prayers after running out of ways to chastise me I wrote poems that became college course material You built a family business with no language, no inheritance, no national identity There is so much ignorance between us When did it become so hard For a mother and daughter To understand each other’s love Once one in the womb Of flesh and blood and sweat And dreams of affording a lavish life Legends to pass on For our future children We become desperate for surrender But neither of us know the words anymore That will translate in the same vein Did I change so much In my ascension to adulthood in America That you no longer know how to address me Or did I grow to become someone unapologetic With an unwavering passion for life Just like you
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One Ounce Gold
Mega Million Mom Money Making Face #1: The Cleaning Lady Dirty laundry was her field Loyal to the business for fifteen plus years Calloused hands encrusted with the heat of labor Early arthritis with each crease folded over Wash and dry cycles Language skills stifled Same day service upon clientele arrival Work labor cycles Reality stifled Washed out dreams hung to dry for a chance of revival There were never enough windows in the Laundromat Chemical detergent, heat waves and lint storms generated a suffocating work environment Sweat—down my mother’s face faster than marathon runners clock it Persistently dripping off the tip of her nose like broken faucets She bends over to kiss me I push her away because I don’t want the sweat from her face to soak my skin Six years old then I cringed at any attempt of mom’s affection Money Making Face #2: The Football Bookie Sunday mornings Wake up to sportscaster voices Unfold the day with sports pages from the Sunday paper Mom sits at the kitchen table Cup of Dunkie’s in one hand, pen on flip notebook in the other Record football bets with phone clenched between ear and shoulder Toss down nickels and dimes in hopes of picking up quarters Code talk—keep the kids innocent about money ‘til they got a little older Football rhetoric Flood young ears like gibberish Touchdowns bring down the house With cash-on-team conflict Arguments ensue with the television set
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One Ounce Gold
While mom neutrally peruses flashing team statistics She was the committed American, football fanatic Money Making Face #3: Black Jack Rookie It all started with Paris By Night Vietnam meets Vegas stage show with the flashing lights Casino hype For that lucky strike Hopes for the last time she might gamble in her life Plants her presence at the Black Jack table 5 foot 3 Vietnamese lady stacks her chips for player appraisal Not a U.S. native Can’t speak the English language But when it comes to reading cards there’s no hesitation Unlike most, she doesn’t gamble with pride Never too greedy to step away to the side There’s too much on the line She’s got her family in mind The ones still living in Vietnam all this time Thirty plus years after the war is over Still got relatives pent-up in wooden shacks above water Wade through high tide just to get to the ladder That leads to their home but no where there after Money Making Face #4: Mega Million Mom Mother slashes numbers For that Mega Million thunder Have a hundred help another Have a hundred help another Mother slashes numbers For that Mega Million thunder Have a hundred help another Have a hundred help another Mom was a regular lotto player with her eyes on the prize The Number’s Game and Cash Millionaire headlined jackpots on the rise
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We made daily trips to the corner store together She penciled in her dreams, picked out numbers for the better While I got Chick-o-Sticks and Lemonheads, Twenty-five cent candy was my chosen treasure During dinner we’d turn on the tube Anxiously await winning numbers post news Maybe finally her dream will come true When we can finally move Out of the a home we shared with mice and cockroaches Roaming beneath us in between floorboards Maybe finally she can buy bà nội a new mattress Back in Vietnam, still sleeping with her back pressed against tile cracks Maybe finally she can build her sister a new home Abandon the water shack still dancing above fish bones Maybe finally they can be at peace with each hour Wooden stilts beneath them won’t buckle with ocean power Maybe finally the tide will turn No more crash and burn Halt financial concerns Money floods her world She’s praying for the day When she’ll no longer have to wait No longer have to play The games that gamble life away She’s ready for the day When the tide will turn her way Money floods No need to save My mom Is the maker and creator of incredible new waves
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A Poem for Dad I’ve yet to reconcile The hybrid nature of our home When it comes to writing poems About you My biggest mistake Is to frame you In the unfitting context Of American feminism Your love is more complex Than fiery battle lines We draw from self-consuming angles At the dinner table I am grateful for your patience To forgive my fuck ups Even though I thought They were my successes Through you I learned The meaning of unconditional love After infuriating you countless times To inspire gray hairs You pretended we had endless cash flow So I would never become stressed With the financial hole We were blindly drowning in Even as I strayed from your vision Of a daughter growing up You never abandoned my potential For who I would become It is not my intention to forget The words of encouragement
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You speak urging me To follow my dreams You let me be me Maybe I should Let you be you But when the test of your manhood Stings my existence The love you’ve cushioned my life Is nuked in a moment of resentment It is my failure as a daughter To condemn you as a sexist What Vietnam upholds as royal dignity America loves to call oppression Fuck these rigid frameworks Theories and rhetoric That create dichotomous perspectives Of loving yourself And understanding others No wonder why Americans are so caught up in reactionary politics Black White This That How selfish of me to expect You acculturate to White values When I was born From Vietnamese blood How ignorant of me to think
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The changes in your physical environment Would alter you when We carry home in our hearts How shameful of me to antagonize Even for a second You as sexist When you are my father The taint of American bigotry Plagued my mind Under the illusion Of a revolutionary budding consciousness Our family is not a field study Ideologies need not validate us Books could never explain You are the most loving man I know
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Santa Clause is Not Real Dear Trang, Santa Clause is NOT real. Now, I know your first grade teacher wants to infuse your imagination with the spirit of magic during this holiday season, but baby I’m your mother and I’m gona tell you how it is! I never knew who Santa was! And nobody told me I was supposed to lie to my kids between the ages of 1 and 7 when I moved to America. We didn’t celebrate Christmas in Vietnam. I grew up in a dinky shack by the ocean held together by planks of wood & sheets of aluminum, so I sure as hell didn’t have a chimney for Santa to climb down! It never snowed in Nha Trang where I grew up, which was nice because every morning before sunrise all the kids of the village would walk out to the beach, play soccer and go swimming. I remember the first time I brought you back to Vietnam and you went swimming in the ocean, your whole body broke out in rashes because the water was too filthy for your soft skin. Most people in the village didn't have a sewage system so it was normal to go to the bathroom in the ocean. But you didn't care, you continued to swim every morning and that's how I knew you would grow up to have tough skin in this world. I know you want to be like all the other kids at school. You want feathery blond hair like Barbie dolls, you want to roast chestnuts by the fireplace, and you want parents who speak perfect English and didn't wear raggedy clothes from Bradlee’s when they picked you up from school. But baby, it's not a bad thing to stand out. You have silky black hair that shines like sapphire. I know you don't like the bowl cut I give you but you look so cute as a tomboy, especially when you wear your denim overalls! In a few years I’ll let you grow your hair out. A big, steaming bowl of pho tastes way better in the frosty wintertime than powdery chestnuts! And even though my English isn't perfect, all of your friends' parents keep asking me for my recipes! You don't have to be like all the other kids to get along with them. Baby you're obviously different but that just means you're unique. Special. If you learn to love yourself first, others will love you for who you are. So let me get this straight—Santa clause is a man who flies around in a magic sleigh led by flying reindeers? Shoot, well where was he when I needed a ride back in 1980?! I was escaping Vietnam after the war and fled on a small boat that almost fell apart in the violent ocean. I risked my life for days without
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food and water, holding my breath for a brighter future because I wanted you to grow up in a better place than I did. Baby, that's real. You ask me stories about the Tooth Fairy, Rudolph, Frosty the Snowman and other characters I know nothing about. I can't tell you any fairy tales, but I can tell you about how your father and I met in Boston after the war. He was from Hanoi in the North and I was from the South, so I was like, "Ugh, I don't hang out with Communists!" But despite our differences, we found love in a devastating time. Baby, that's real. I got your wish list. You asked for an Easy Bake Oven and Dalmatian puppies, but I got you some legwarmers and thick socks for the brutal New England winter. You'll thank me later. I refuse to wrap secret gifts, sneak them under the tree then give all the credit to an imaginary old white man who never did anything for me! Your father and I work our asses off washing clothes and painting houses to give you everything you have. It's not much right now, but we are alive, healthy and together. Baby, that's real. I will never be like the other American parents. And you will never be like the other kids Merry Christmas. Love,
Mom
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Gangsta Momma My momma is so gangsta She dropped out of school at fourteen Left her water hut home To slang a living on the streets Some gangstas dodge stray bullets Mom danced the duck-and-cover Arms flung over her head To block the blaring of sky high sirens, She rearranged the target of American bombs My momma is so gangsta She said “Fuck this war.” Carried nothing but Everything she believed In her heart Onto a wooden asylum To ride the tide of changing times And bare the thrashing of turmoil against thin plank walls Deeper than gangsta whips and low riders She cruises below sea level until light welcomes her back into the world My momma is so gangsta She hustled the ocean Slayed sea monsters Wrestled with pirates And lived still to talk about it all Except she doesn’t talk about it at all Because unlike most gangstas She doesn’t need to brag about how many times She almost died To know she’s a bad ass survivor Fuck street cred My mom got the motherfuckin’ Pacific under her belt My momma is so gangsta She said “Fuck the U.S. government.” Robbed the establishment of millions of dollars to rebuild a family overseas
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Sneak in new relatives through immigration loopholes Plead the fifth, play innocent and blast her fresh off the boat attitude to the exponential degree My momma is so gangsta She keeps her personal savings account at home Tucked away in a secret place where the bank can’t fuck with her money My momma is so gangsta She sleeps with the surveillance tapes on My momma is so gangsta She walks with elbows high and hips that jerk from side to side My momma is so gangsta She wears gloves during the day My momma is so gangsta She will murda you with her eyes My momma is so gangsta She lived a thousand lives in one My momma is so gangsta She doesn’t need to brag about how many times she almost died Because my momma is so gangsta She is ready to die My momma is so gangsta Because my mom Loves her family to death
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Green Grass Growing up on Greenwood Avenue, dad had a strange obsession with grass. Every time we walked through the park of a densely green area, he would stop mid-track, run his fingers through the blades and say, "Ooh, tốt quá! Tại sao cỏ của mình không như thế? How come our grass doesn’t look like that? Too many Sunday walks through the Arboretum Park sent my dad on a landscaping frenzy. With the sun pressing heat waves against his back, dad yanked every weed from the front yard; bare hands digging through the soil until dirt was buried deep beneath fingernails. Arm wrestling with the earth recalls days of body wrestling with ocean waves, where refugee boats became asylums in the wild Pacific. Sailing away from a fallen city, my dad looked toward the horizon for a brighter future. Next, he spread the seeds; celebrate the birth of tomorrow, cover every inch of the front yard with a new foundation, and leave no visible remnants of rocky edges underneath his green new beginning. Everyday, my dad watered the front yard proudly and watched the blades of his new vision slowly sprout from the ground. But the grass never grew quite the way he wanted it to. Sometimes, it wasn't thick enough, with patches of failed growth that looked like premature front yard balding. Other times, it wasn't green enough; it had to be greener than the green of money and smell fresher than the dollar press. One time, he tried cheating and covered the entire yard with pre-grown grass mats. But the relentless sun challenged him in his own game of cover-up and melted away the foundation of his landscape. He felt defeated on a checkerboard battlefield of green and brown square patches. No matter how many times he tried, it was never good enough. The night before my father fled Vietnam, he left behind a letter for my grandmother—telling her not to worry about him, and that he set sail to make things better. Running to American soil, he had heroic hopes of sifting through new land for golden opportunity. But the only ladders he climbed were ones to fix rooftops and paint houses; travel 8000 miles to be a second class citizen—refugee status, just an immigrant, knew no English, had no
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recognition for his intelligence. It didn’t matter how he saw his life, in the eyes of others, he was never seen as a true American. With an invincible spirit, the front yard was territory for my dad to push the frontiers of his American dreams. All he wanted was a rich, green front yard for the world to see because maybe then, the world would believe in him too. And even though the grass never quite grew the way he wanted it to, and the world may never see all the blades of his labor, I loved our front yard just the way it was – slightly disoriented, never perfect, rough patches and edges of a broken yesterday beautiful still with its unwanted golden yellow weeds. My family sprouts from the seeds of revolution. A germination at the intersection of American intervention with Vietnam’s Independence. A breathing landscape is broken with the unforeseen forecast of thunderous bombs; Agent Orange silently mutilates the last string of survivors; beneath the aerial invasion, entire villages are wiped out with merciless massacres by American soldiers. Unforgiving winds force an exodus of refugees to take flight like the exhale of a child’s breath on a fluffy dandelion releasing seeds into the world. Dandelions never cease to bloom through rocky terrain, the beauty of struggle to inspire between cement cracks and fragments of daily hustle. Decades later, we see the seeds of this dandelion sprout all across the nation and plant roots deep within our hearts. From San Jose to Westminster, Louisiana to Dorchester, nail salons to laundromats, pho shops and floorsanding, No matter how many times the weed is uprooted, it is always the last flower standing. Still we stand.
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IV. Who do you live for?
Idolize Praise until empty Raise him on a pedestal Fallen off your throne
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Independent Women Independent women I know Paid their way through college Worked 2 jobs and one under the table All the while saying, “This isn’t me. I’m better than this.” Then continue to wipe down tables into overtime In order to afford textbooks for class Independent women I know Packed their lives up into a U-Haul To raise their children alone While the father was off having an affair With someone half his age And when the kids screamed and cried for their dad Independent women I know cried too Independent women I know Moved 3000 miles across the country To pursue the most promising careers Sacrificed niece’s 4th birthdays And little sister’s first prom date To make enough money to send home every few months Independent women I know Can’t seem to fall in love They love the idea of it But hate the feeling of growing emotionally invested And uncontrollably distressed Getting weak in the knees Feels like a crumbling Statue of Liberty They fear they’ll forget the path to walk Independent women I know Still love it when men open doors Independent women I know Love entertaining guests with home-cooked meals
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Independent women I know Have tattoos to offset first impressions Independent women I know Get butterflies Independent women I know Never hesitate to speak their mind Even in the crossfire of debate and disapproval They’ll risk being called a “bitch” To be the real boss this place needs Independent women I know Love and hate themselves at the same time They love being a free spirit Untamed by the shackles of society Flying high above the dormant consciousness of citizens To discover truth in a murky past But independent women I know Hate when their golden flight is shot down As a terrorist attack On traditional ideals Independent women I know Are amongst the real recognize real It is what It is what It is. Independent women I know Use solitude as an excuse for drive Independent women I know Get scared when thinking about the future Independent women I know Don’t always know how to accept help They’re too busy trying to save the world on their own
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Hearts and crowns Are the pillars to hold up the sky They forgot how good it feels to collapse in the clouds Independent women I know Can do it all on their own Even though no woman I know wants to go through life alone For the independent woman Who isn’t afraid to fight and to love I salute you
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Amazing Race What does the amazing race look like? Can it be Asians? Claiming Ivy League seats to piss off White parents Boasting brand new Lexus convertibles in a hood of Camry’s Hiding 6 bullets in his chest underneath the mechanic’s jumpsuit Lying rock still beneath the needle to complete a full body dragon tattoo Buying dinner with WIC stamps for a family of 10 Dominating the street wear game without rocking the brand Going under the knife to imitate whiteness Bombing subway trains with rusty Krylons Taking outstanding SAT’s to stir envy Dropping out of high school to play premature daddy Building a home from ash and stones Licking every savory flake off measly fishbones Dancing with death while seeking refuge at sea Slanging bootleg Louis Vuitton for all the wannabe’s What does the amazing race look like? Can it be Asians? Praised as the Model Minority Pitted against Blacks Condemned as the foreigner Denied citizenship status Attacked as bloodsuckers Every time their success threatens others They say the American Dream belongs to everyone through meritocracy As long as it doesn’t change the face of their democracy Playing so many roles at once because not one role can define Asians Yet only existing in Amerika’s eyes as a race of convenience
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For Richmond Step into the mob Where time is fast forwarded Outcasting is a crime And doing the right thing becomes social suicide She was only fifteen Her adolescent body ripped apart by a pack of wolves Gang raped until blue in the face Consecutive train wrecks Stacked collisions with every thrust Robbed hollow with the pieces of her mangled spirit tossed beneath the picnic table She fell into the mob Too many fairy tales growing up convinced her this was the trail to follow The promise of male attention enticed an innocent walk through the woods Leading her to the center of a nightmare never before described in bedtime stories Legs spread defenseless in the center of a mob, The world can shrink so fast Consciousness slips from the able mind Fear begs for livid overcast to forget the time The mob said it was okay For ten men to rape her all at once The mob said it was okay For twenty more to indulge with their camera phones The mob said it was okay For nobody to snitch The mob said it was okay Because she was only fifteen The mob said it was okay
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Because it would've happened to her anyways The mob said it was okay Because the mob speaks volumes to one person But so many people forget One person speaks louder than the mob
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So We Give In a not so far away land called Famous Water fountains squirt champagne Famous citizens pick diamonds off the sky And the cameras never stop rolling It's hard to say what people want more: To share their talent with the world Or To create a world that craves them Meals become overrated The only thing worth thirsting for Is an appetite for the limelight People spend their lives navigating the galaxy to discover a path into Famous Land The social revolution on YouTube opens windows If Justin Bieber can do it, Then who will be next? So we give Building a following is as good as self-proclaimed fame Tunnel vision for high volume traffic A drive-thru view of flashy billboards flashing high profile names So we give We master webcam conversations Confessions on the video blog Drop panties like it's a race Become the Wordpress narcissist Post YouTube videos with misleading titles like, "Pictures of Rihanna's Pumpkin Smashed Face" Lure traffic to no such photos Only the disappointment of another video dummy Doing the daily gossip cast We poke the hell out of each other until poking got boring
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So we hopped on the Facebook status until that got boring (except that has yet to happen because there is never a dull moment) So we doubled the fun with our friends on Twitter Triple the shutter speed to capture our features Became crack fiends with the Facebook Live Feed And like any addiction, Our brains are encapsulated before we know it So captivated by the contents of the computer Eyeballs blaring before the monitor like zombie faces waiting for live news to reel in juicier than TMZ headlines Because everybody wants to know what everybody else is doing Even more Everybody wants everybody else to know what THEY are doing So we give Mobile uploads to incriminate Fuck you Sally's to instigate Baby I loooove you's Now everybody knows Sally is a bitch (or the person posting or both) Who's that slut in the photo? F.M.L. Let me be drama Follow me to Wonderbar Follow me to work Don't follow me but FYI I'll be at fish taco in 1200 hours Follow my wall comments, my recent activity, my every thought Follow my Tweets Follow my friends Follow my insecurity Follow my ego Follow my fame Follow me seeee? As long as there is someone following, I must be worth watching I must be worth something
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I must be worth There was a time when the U.S. government tried hard to be sneaky Secretive about relinquishing privacy rights Fine lines in the Patriot Act But the people put up a fight Because the people wanted more So we give We give so much of ourselves Taking is no gamble The game is easy No need for asking We've already surrendered ourselves empty Private information now suddenly a public spectacle Then hoarded away in a central bureau So we give We forget what privacy felt like It's hard to resist the excitement When the newsreel is rolling so fast Jump in If you don't Tweet your way into the digital world You might find yourself banging the space bar Drift off into the galaxy A forgotten star Compromise our wants with our haves So we give
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V. Are you making decisions from joy or from fear?
Time Idle eyes of idle nights The heart falls victim to fight or flight Dreams so big they paralyze My mind surrenders to new heights A thick desire to break free Without quite knowing what will be The world is calling upon me To become the one I’ve yet to meet I stall and stall to kill the clock That suffocates the beating heart If I wait too long I might mistake The gifts to give with fear to take
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Sestina: Apocalypse Gazing
As we watch the tidal wave To wash away our last day We pray that the end Of the world will cleanse our souls With the urgency to live every moment Like it would be our last on earth An eruption from the belly sends shocks through the earth Shattering the surface and creating another wave Of hungry, homeless Hatians without a moment To stare at their photo albums or kiss loved ones before the day They were stripped naked, then forced to bare their souls On television for the world to help them recover from the rumbling’s end Walk to the edge of the cliff and you will discover the end But even this point opens up to infinite space on earth Where there are no boundaries below, above or from any angle of our souls. Walking on air feels like being swept up in a wave Of faith when nothing is concretely clear about our day But we recognize our breath in each growing moment Who hired the Apocalypse to instill fear of the final moment? Stocking up on batteries and water to survive past the end, Time melts into minutes, then into the never-ending day Ready to fall asleep but not fall off this earth, The next generation has yet to make a wave Unborn noise waiting to awake sleeping souls How many of our neighbors are already dead souls Walking through the looking glass but failing to see themselves in each moment? Wading too close to the shore instead of riding the wave How many tsunamis have forced upon innocent lives their merciless end? Some submerged in the hungry Pacific to kiss the bottom of the earth And others vowed never to take for granted the ability to see day
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If today were to be our last day Would it terrify or inspire souls? If you had to leave everything behind on this earth How would you want to remember your last moment? Perhaps there is no such thing as the end When unforeseen beginnings come along with every wave Live your life on earth like every ticking was your last moment Not a day to waste or inhibitions to plague curious souls When a tide comes crashing to its end, emerge to be the power behind a new wave
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No Fool’s Haiku Nomadic packrat Sticks and stones, money and bones We all turn to dust
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Sestina: Fireflies
The firefly catcher chases after the light In the darkness, she questions Whether she is crazy Or if this world can sustain her sanity Definition gains credibility through repetition But there is only one of her in this world. Occupy movements sprout all around the world A sleeping giant is beckoned to wreak havoc in the light We are the 99% resonates with repetition Demanding answers to all the people’s questions Endless nights of encampment put a strain on everyone’s sanity Are we visionaries fighting for real change or just plain crazy? When no one sees what you see, they call it crazy-Delusional beings with their heads floating in another world If vision is relative, who’s to judge another’s sanity? When the sun rises, the whole world is kissed by the light If more people learned to ask questions Perhaps we can break free from this cycle of degenerative repetition When we live our lives in routine repetition, Like a hamster running in the same place, we’ll go crazy Sometimes life’s answers come from asking the right questions Undiscovered territory exists beyond our physical world Happy people radiate a light From within that shines to show an unconditioned source of sanity When you act unpopular, people challenge your sanity But even popularity can be questioned through the repetition Of others, large or small, every light Has the potential to illuminate crazy Amounts of exposure on a world That pays it way out of confronting difficult questions Our best discoveries came from asking ridiculous questions
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Which oftentimes led others to mock the individual’s sanity But when you are fearless to stand out in the world You can evolve beyond predictable repetition Of ideas, expectations and perhaps feel a little crazy But like chasing fireflies in the night, it’ll have you jumping in wild directions for the light When the world falls into a stifling repetition One must question given patterns to sharpen one’s sanity There is no such thing as crazy as long as the sun’s relativity means we’ll always see the light
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Fear in Becoming Who I know I am only exists in the present If every moment brings about evolution in time and space And every morning I wake up to a new day Then how much do I know about where I will stand in the future? The things I know I like I know I like right now And for all the things I have never tried To say I wouldn’t like it is a lie A mere projection of the present me On the future me Getting to know the future me Is like mindreading I trust myself, But I can never predict the set of experiences And encounters I have yet to feel, To know how they will shape the present me Into becoming me So I trust myself But I trust that there are parts of me I have yet to meet
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Acknowledgments I acknowledge that one day I will die, as will each of us. Accepting this and embracing this helps me to overcome the fear of death; therefore I am not afraid to die, I am afraid to have not lived the life I truly want. I use this understanding as motivation to live fully and fearlessly, because time in this lifetime is finite. Time is priceless; it is the one resource we haven’t been able to commodify. So how you value your time, spend it and share it, will be a reflection of yourself. And even though death marks an end to one lifetime, the truth is we can never run out of time in our lives, we can only waste time. And once we die, what is there to hold on to? Everything will be gone, thus I am learning to let go of attachments. I can’t take any of the money or material possessions with me when I die. (Luckily in Buddhism, my family members will burn money and fruits for me to enjoy in the afterlife). Oftentimes the question will arise, “What do you have to lose?” Money, a job, time, assets, pride, ego, pride and ego. Are any of these things worth holding on to at the expense of experience when one day we will be lying on the deathbed, with no way to defend our pride or ego? I acknowledge that my pride and ego have often been my biggest enemies—shooting the second arrow into my open wounds, belittling my spirit through cruel deprecation, denying myself the courage to pursue an opportunity. And it’s a pity, to do this. It’s a greater pity to acknowledge this and continue to do so. I also acknowledge that my birth and my death are neither the beginning nor the end. How much existed before me in order for me to exist in the present? I’m not just talking about my family tree (we don’t even have one of those). I’m talking about all the wars and the genocides, the demolitions and the victories, that enable me to exist in this moment and space of time to enjoy the luxuries I have, complain about the shit I do, love in all the ways I know, hurt in the ways I hate and exercise the privileges I’ve inherited like sitting here and writing this “Acknowledgements” page. I’m a star, that’s for sure. But I am one star of infinite galaxies of infinite stars through unending cycles of brightness and dust. I acknowledge this, not to depreciate my value or my significance, because I am a very important person (yes I am), but to humble myself and remember that this life, this world, this purpose, is always bigger than me alone. I could flatter myself and say, “I’ve arrived!” but does anyone ever really arrive? And if you arrive, does it mean it is time to die? (Because an
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arrival often marks the end of a journey). I don’t believe I’ll ever arrive. I am eternally becoming. Lastly, I acknowledge that I was born into a system of intricately woven systems. So how do I “Fight the system!” that feeds me, breeds me and enables me to “fight” the system? I acknowledge that as long as I live in an industrialized and capital-driven society, I am a contradiction. I am a contradiction every time I buy a white chocolate latte from Coffee Bean. I am a contradiction every time I shop at H&M. I am a contradiction every time I party like a rock star. I do all of these things and I love it. I don’t necessarily love being a contradiction, but I love living my life without judgment if it means I can enjoy some of the simple pleasures in the short time that I have on this earth. Our world is far from perfect and humans are no closer to it. We are too complex to ever reach perfection. Hence, perfection is a futile goal. We should embrace our complexity. Complexity creates both love and war inside of us. For some reason, it is easier to hate ourselves, to fight ourselves, to hurt ourselves, than it is to love ourselves. Loving ourselves to walk away from an unhealthy relationship. Loving ourselves to uphold everything we know we deserve. Loving ourselves to give permission to pursue without resistance. Thus, for all the wars inside of us, and all the wars around us, whether it’s “Fighting the system” or fighting yourself, the path to freedom requires unconditional compassion. Not most of all or least of all, I acknowledge that this text would not have fulfilled its full purpose without you. As mentioned above, your time is priceless, and I thank you deeply for sharing your time with me. Love, Sahra Vang Nguyen
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