By Serena Suson
Art by Sophie Williams
My blood is pure
I boast my aspect
To my family and my peers
Take turns showing off my skin
I once did anything to whiten
Yet I’ve never visited
That place that holds my name
The grounds of our estate
The place of which my parents speak
The islands of my fathers’ graves
I am brown
But cannot speak my mother tongue
I am no one
I am American
Underneath the flagship of this shining sun
I know history
But can’t make sense of mine
The conflicts
That razed my people
Into independence
I only know the redcoats
In three years covered
The Continental Congress
In every bloodbound book I own
’76 will always mean more than ’46
My home will be a melting pot
Of ingenuity
We’ll engineer representation
In our books and in our movies
Forgetting it was a white man
Who promised peace and subjugated
When he rolled up on the beach
But to me
MacArthur’s just a nuisance
And I believe in something far away
There’s no more imperialism
Nothing colonial
In my identity
Though the armistice has ceased
Whatever way I see it
There’s always been a freedom
A freedom to the seas
My blood is clear
Prime for pollution
That my moldering will cause
Multiculturalism's a chance to prove
I am more than what I am
Yet I miss to know
Clearly what I was
I am lost
In the suburban-ly mundane
Nights of mac and cheese
Dinner with green beans
Football games
And spelling bees
There must be more to me
Than this
But Tagalog, hindi
Balat, pancit
I’m a foreigner birthed in white
Who can’t translate history
My country ‘tis of thee
Sweet land of liberty
I am of you
And you are of me
The bleakness of my nature
To which I kneel
I’m to forget
I laud without regret
Dulce et decorum —
Fight on, boys!
For I see that flag and weep
It means I am no one
It means I am American
Underneath the red, white, and blue
I am no one
I am American
I embrace the greenness of this setting sun.
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