There may be some derogatory racial terms included in this poem but due to saving the artist’s voice and emphasis, we decided to leave them in this piece of art.

I’m a banana

because I’m

yellow on the outside

but white on the inside.

I’m not asian enough to wear the ao dai.

I don’t speak like them,

I don’t act like them.

Funny, because

I was too asian

When the kids at school laughed at my food and told me it was smelly.

Pull their eyes back,

One,

Two,

Three,

Say chinky.

I wasn’t mustard enough to fall through the cracks in cafeteria tables.

But I feel a pit when you tell me

I’m not what I am.

So I’ll explain I’m trying to learn the language,

I just don’t have time.

That my mom is a refugee, and she was forced to leave the culture behind.

Sealed her devotion to Jesus Christ by marrying a pair of blonde hair and blue eyes.

I want to not care.

I don’t know why I care.

Why am I so insecure about something as big

as my own identity?

I am half

empty.