Foreigner, 1850

Tell me,

when did citizen become foreigner?

exile from village

enemy of state

stranger to soil surrounding roots

wandering from place to place

targeted by white majority

outsider amongst family 

slowly becoming illiterate

to the language and culture we inherited

tell me,

when did alienation become family tradition?

was it when parents pen pal'd escape plan under fake identity?

crossing blue desert on aerial steed towards American dream?

or was it when dinner table dialogue with descendants 

no longer beat like heart language?

the way you speak of home

makes me think 

all of the above 

tell me,

did they ever warn you about the days

your tongue would crave salt 

from an ocean far away?

how you'd wish to be able to send back more than just your wages?

did both Venezuelan and Californian shores

witness wistful winds from native land 

sail into your harbor?

the way your face firecracker'd with joy

at each mention of Causeway Bay

makes me think

your heart never truly left

tell me,

how did they see you when you became citizens?

did they judge you based off of mispronounced indigenous name?

was your behavior white enough to satisfy the leprosy in their melanin?

the way your heart rate was triggered

by English read like braille 

stamped on mail

makes me think

you saw yourselves the same way

tell me,

did you think through the consequences of assimilation?

forbidden fruit eaten for survival

while rotting our roots 

fleeing from discrimination

but running instead towards rejection 

an exclusion act against self

erasing a silk road of beauty enfolded in our hutong heritage

robbing future generations 

of the taste of jasmine

never before has a better life come at the cost

of a culture

this,

the journey of a

perpetual foreigner

too spicy for here

too sweet for motherland

never good enough for either

but there was a stranger

whose divine dialect

and filial piety

invited discrimination,

welcomed rootlessness,

tasted exile

and the good news is

He prepares a pair of slippers and sliced fruit

for fellow foreigners 

who have experienced the same