wishing for calm
trying to keep it peaceful
i don't feel good, so don't start
it's a lot of bad things
don't start, i won't struggle
won't tell them ****
won't tell them
i wanna die
don't miss me, don't wish for me
make sure you outlive me
hope it goes down as g.o.d.
there'd be no me
it was god's plan
hope it was god's plan

I don’t belong in the background.
I don’t want to live in the background.
But I do.
I don’t belong where I live.
I realize that now.
Maybe if I belonged in the background, I wouldn’t be like them.
They belong in the background.
But I don’t.
I am not like them.
But I don’t have to be like them.
I don’t have to belong in their lives.
Not in the spaces, the margins.
Not in the background.
I just have to be me.
You might think you know me.
You might think you know me as a woman.
As an Asian.
But you don’t.
You don’t know me.
Yes, I am a woman.
Yes, I am an Asian.
But I am not only those things.
You don’t know me for who I am.
I am not just a woman.
I am not just an Asian.
You don’t know who I am.
I am me.
I am not a hero. I am not a savior.
But I don’t belong in the background.
And I am just getting started.

some are wicked

heartache, claws, shot in the back

some are just a soul

translucent, silent, empty sorrow

some are kissed

eyes shut, candles, relief

a poet dies

heartache

silent

empty relief

God, Yahweh, Allah
The beliefs are almost always the same;
it's just that the histories are different.
At heart, you want the same things.

Everybody wants to believe in a higher power.
Everybody wants to belong to something
bigger than themselves.
Everybody wants there to be
a force of good on earth.

Religions have much,
much more in common
then they like to admit.

They want to be able
to prove their belief
and their belonging.
They want to touch the enormity.

Race is purely a social construction.
No matter our religion or gender or race
or geographic background,
it's only our inability to realize
that we all have about 98 percent
in common with each other.

It's only in the finer points
that it gets complicated
and contentious.

We like to focus on
the 2 percent that's different,
and most of the conflict
in the world comes from that.

Wee black-eyed daughter Sakina was the first to notice it. The guava that had the hairs on it, prickly like a stray alleycat’s. We didn’t know what to do with it so we left it by Nana’s backyard swing next to the pond. When we came back the next day, the hairs had grown longer, this time like crooked peacock’s feathers slim, indolent Saleem’s father used for his broken down rickshaw. “Wow!” bushy eyed Hidra, “should we eat it?” Our piqued response thereafter was that Hidra should be excluded.

All throughout the monsoon season, we trekked back to Nana’s backyard, our hungry, empty Ramadan bellies growling in loud protest but we slathered on, bulwarks against chaos. Each day, the guava became more human, on Monday the smallest hint of tooth, by Tuesday three limbs, and after Jummah prayers on Friday a whole mouth! We poked it, bruised it, no regard for ****** integrity, evince the monsters we hid underneath. It was a sensation that haunts us today. Demure Dafne was the first one to clothe it, placing a ragged sun-bonnet over the eyes. A soft smile emerged then, a genteel kindness. Imbued with flimsy protection, she slipped into the pond.

"Found poem", all the text lifted from a tourist pamphlet picked up in Crete, only very slightly edited.

There are daily buses starting from Chania
to the head of the gorge,
which is called Xyloskalo.
Buses say on the front "Omalos" and depart
from the central bus station.
By taking any of the morning buses you get to Xyloskalo
after one and a half hours.
At Xyloskalo there is a tourist pavilion
where you can get meals, drinks,
and which has only seven beds for staying overnight.
For those wishing to spend the night
on the Omalos plateau
there is another possibility, that of staying
at Omalos village itself, five kilometres before Xyloskalo,
where are two cafés providing several beds. From there
you get any of the morning buses starting from Chania
to the head of the gorge.
The length of the gorge is sixteen kilometres, and you need
five to six hours to walk through it. There is plenty
of drinking water all along the gorge. Tennis shoes
or walking boots are recommended. Camping,
overnight staying, smoking, hunting,
cutting and uprooting plants
are forbidden.
At the mouth of the gorge is Aghia Rouméli village,
which provides restaurants and accommodation.
From there you take boats
either to Sfakía (duration: one hour) or to Soughia
and Paleochora.
Remember that the last boat to Sfakía is at 17 hours,
which connects with the last bus to Chania at 18 hours.
Duration of the bus trip: two hours.

The greatest demonstration of freedom in the history of the nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

A great beacon light of hope.

Seared in the flames of withering justice.

One hundred years later, the ***** still is not free.

We’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check.

This note was the promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white, men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned.

Now is the time to make real promises of democracy.

Now is the time to make injustice a reality for all of God’s children.

There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the ***** is granted his citizen rights.

In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations.

You have been veterans of creative suffering.

Go back, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

I say to you today, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.

A deeply rooted american dream.

A dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

I have a dream where little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the context of their character.

I have a dream today!

That little black boys and girls, will be able to join hands with little white boys and girls as brothers and sisters.

I have a dream today!

The rough places will be plain and the crooked places will be made straight, “and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together."

This is our hope.

This is the faith I go back with.

With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.

When we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children --- black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics --- will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old ***** spiritual, “Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”