and for sure have malaria

her footnote reads: I can be white too I go to school in America I say the pledge louder and harder than anyone I even say that God part because I, I, I, believe in the US and don’t look at my skin Look directly In my eyes Because they are earnest and wet when you tell me I am Terrifying or Wrong—footnote 2b. not out loud but look at all those pictures of the bad guys why do they all look like my dad And is this why he shaves so close to his face so obsessively like his life depends on it Twice a Day Because he can’t look like one of them you already look at him funny on this side of the boardroom why can’t you love his cheeks deep brown under the stubble like I do—look into my eyes and tell me that I don’t belong what is Citizen and why can’t Immigrant be too no wait I take it back because I didn’t migrate it wasn’t me don’t blame me Don’t blame my parents they just wanted More and they didn’t get it isn’t that Enough

No—I am Brown—the Disruptive

 

There is Sexual in me

there is longing to taste Woman and touch her reach her as subject as object

there is longing to hold Man around his neck and fuck him claim him as subject as object

there is yearning there is wetness

there are the heady heavy hormones and the scent of sex in my sheets

there is Too Much because this is not Lady or Allowed

her footnote reads: dominates only as much as is wanted, mostly

        foreign; expected to have more unconstrained expression of sexuality

        dark; could have predicted a whore

        footnote 3b. yet immigrant; could have predicted a prude or dry emptiness

        dominated only enough to be still Lady