Why should I feel discouraged and why do the shadows come?
God, god sometimes I forget who I am.
Flashback:
Born and raised in west Los Angeles in a neighborhood 75% African American.
Was told that my blood was a mixture of Chinese and Spanish that made Filipino from an island that was in Asia, but told I was not Asian. I was babysat by Hispanic when who spoke Spanish to the children, including me.
Now, go ahead and tell me about your identity crisis growing up.
And it didn't help that the one store around the corner sold 40s, Mexican, and Chinese food.
I knew there was a problem when carnya sonya, Chow Mein, and liquor became a scent that was familiar.
Even my nose got confused.
Though the furthest place from heaven, this was the city of angels and I saw them on occasion sleeping on clouds shaped like park benches turned twin mattresses.
Running streets like dogs without collars. The only place you can make a bummed angel disappear or a stripper named Angel come here with a single dollar, but I figured they were just trying to by their wings back.
Then we packed and moved to the suburbs.
No hood, no good.
Now it was 40% eses, 40% brothers, 15% honkey, 5% other. Even my title meant outsider.
It was a much nicer place but I learned to hate here.
I learned to read books by the cover, I learned that racism doesn't start with hate, it starts with the misunderstanding and fear of another.
On my first day of school this little cholo asked me why I talked the way I did.
I told him it must have been that West LA island, ching-chang, Spanish slang I picked up from Los Angeles, but he didn't care what color my feathers were, the same motherf**er got the nerve to ask me how I chink like me deserved to carry a Spanish last name.
In the 9th grade I was called a Jap and a wet back on the same day, by different people, in different ways.
One joking, one not, both thought they were funny, both not.
It all ended with my bro walking up to me saying “Yo, what's wrong my n***a?”
Now, tell me you wouldn't be just a little confused.
When it got to the point where people asked, “What are you?” I just thought of the answer that made them feel more comfortable, like I was practiced at making other people feel better about themselves by forgetting who I was.
What are you?
I used to dance around the question like a one legged ballerina trying not to draw too much attention but the tension of trying to dance to the music without knowing the roots finally taught me a lesson.
My whole life people tried to figure me out had never asked me the same question- “Who am I?”
I was the only non-African American in my gospel group, the only Filipino in my urban poets crew, the only non-Hispanic on my soccer team, the only broken angel in this whole f**ing city it seemed,
and I remembered that when people asked me questions that would make me feel uncomfortable I would start singing softly for a second.
And seconds turned into minutes, minutes to hours, and in quiet, dark places I used to ask questions. So, if you ask me a question and I begin to sing. It's not that I didn't hear you the first time;
it's just my way of telling god that I've finally found me, and it sounds a whole lot like music.