Banana, Split (revised)

She knows all the words to Weezer,

was Go-Go Yubari for Halloween

and, in her white-washed mind, her chipmunk cheeks are the

the hottest you’ve ever seen

dressing like a school girl-dragon lady-

ex-Asian hyping the exotic East,

Hangul hurts her hands

so she settles for (what she’s pretty sure is) kanji

Reclaims her hanguk saram handle

But failure by any other name

still reeks like rotting from the inside out--

diseased with something awful, incurable

no matter how many yellow-fevered topicals

coat that vapid pout.

Hitchhiking--no, sidestepping--toward self discovery

or identity-reclamation all for popularity--

she breaks a sweat, remains half a hemisphere away--

grows Madame Butterfly wings

but stays grounded, West of anything worth finding,

blathering on to white boys about how much she’s already found,

pukes out a drunken, broken hangul greeting

and doesn’t understand that

solidarity does not make us friends.

She’s unable to speak--no, unable to be,

all her heart’s sob stories about hidden bloodlines

language lost, and guilty conscience

all turn to pathetic cries for sympathy.

The day can’t come soon enough

when she brings those bloodlines out of hiding,

lets her wrong turns pool beneath her

and still can’t tell

if our stories run the same color.

More Hatin'

NOTE: Personally, I get way more pissed off about ignorant people of color who ought to know better not knowing better and, in doing so, making us all look bad. This is especially true with other adoptees who "consider themselves white." Shut up; you are not white. Stop embarrassing yourself and everyone else by rejecting who you are. Most of the time, I just feel sorry for people but there's this one person I know who just pisses me off because of 1. how misinformed she is and 2. how loud she is about it.

I should also mention that I am not claiming to be any kind of authority on self-discovery or identity issues but I feel we can all agree that there is something very wrong when a Korean adoptee dresses up like a Japanese school girl at a party and doesn't understand why none of the other Asian people want to talk to her.

This is still a draft.

Banana, Split

She knows all the words to Weezer,

was Go-Go Yubari for Halloween

and, in her white-washed mind, her chipmunk cheeks are the

the hottest you’ve ever seen

dressing like a school girl-dragon lady-

ex-Asian hyping the exotic East

Hangul hurts her hands

so she settles for (what she’s pretty sure is) kanji

Reclaims her hanguk saram handle

But a piece of shit by any other name

still reeks like she’s rotting from the inside out--

diseased with something awful, incurable

no matter how many yellow-fevered topicals

coat that vapid pout.

Hitchhiking--no, sidestepping--toward self discovery

or identity-reclamation all for popularity--

she breaks a sweat, remains half a hemisphere away--

darling, you’ve got to go down the road,

not cross the street

and, remember, before you puke out

that drunken, broken hangul greeting at a party

that solidarity doesn’t mean

I want to stand next to you.

I’ve seen Japanophile white girls less offensive than she is--

all alternating between being full of shit and white-boy dick,

cleavage over-represented like adopted names in suicide rates

trying too hard to carve her story into a history she doesn’t get

when she’d be better off slitting her wrists into the statistics she hasn’t seen.

Bottom-feeding, sub-human, double-race-traitor, wannabe,

I don’t care about how hard you had it,

Mom was too distant, Dad had a whore-habit--

She’s unable to speak--no, unable to be,

all her heart’s sob stories about hidden bloodlines

language lost, and guilty conscience

all turn to pathetic cries for sympathy.

The day can’t come soon enough

when she opens up a vein or two,

lets her complaints pool beneath her

and still can’t tell

if our blood runs the same color.

Another number

If my murder is called manslaughter, let me take some solace in being a man.

Initial 8 Deal/Who is still reading this?

Initial 8 Deal: I have 8 copies of Confrontations: A Skull & Poems Reader to sell to the hardcore fans. In each of these initial eight, I will scrawl a different poem of mine unincluded in the anthology--devaluing the publication significantly. First come, first serve.

Hatin'

This is a very rough first draft completed a few minutes ago in response to annoying poetry and poets that I hope never to write or become.

"Rock Bottom" or "Nothing Good Has Ever Been Written in a Coffeehouse."

I don’t write poems so much as

loaded prose with line breaks

to break with other writers writing,

trying to rhyme or protest problems

that they think they see through

unwashed bangs to get some spotlight

while they read their poems about injustice--

Washed up thinking it makes them so fresh and so clean clean

blasting ripped off hip hop chops amidst all their stagnant energy.

Not so eloquent but the message is clear--is it? whatever.

Like “Raise your fist and get behind the rhyme,

rep that solidarity; your eyes and hair and life’s like mine

so buy my book!!”

They suck it up but still can’t bare those teeth

past reactionary sneering, yelling shit nobody cares about,

put too much faith in bleeding hearts like it’s something we should care about

and scar those painted nails on purpose, break their own hearts to wear that pout

so pretty under Zelda hair and irony.

But you wear it well in coffeehouses

looking deep with pregnant pauses,

affectations for a round of applause--better yet, a hand job

keep those fingers doing something

(they sure as hell aren’t writing)

Energize your bunny keep on going going going

like your poem will sputter something if you keep adding adding adding

words, lines, and paragraphs

like a stone soup,

you’ve hit rock bottom

but keep digging.

Thursday Poem

Also here.

"A (very) Loose Reflection on SB1070 by an Arizona Poet" or "Jan Brewer Doesn't Care About Your Faggy Poem"

Gonna write a story about a poet that mattered--

poems were more than performance pieces

playing for that pussy--

wrote real protests, rhyming prose

and politicians listened,

traded out Andrew Jacksons for poet-influenced decisions

Gonna write a story about a poem that made a difference--

line breaks broke police lines better than bottles could have

and a rhyme scheme at play with no ulterior motive

like “I just came to read my poem

with no rising inflections, no silly affectations,

just feeling”

Gonna write a story about getting lost in my stories--

wrapped up in pages,

curled up cover to cover

and sweet sugar plum dreams

that poems are more than catharsis

for under-rep’ed frustration,

fragments of community

or a voice for the voiceless.

Barroom Revelation

I'm going to put this out here: it is almost impossible to tell a stranger "I am writing a book" without sounding like a tremendous asshole.