I. Glass Snow Globe

I used to have a miniature snow globe made out of glass,

All so beautiful,

The snow swirling in it,

While giving happiness to the small families in the small houses.

Around the world, everything’s okay,

Society looks breathtaking with everyone enjoying every step of the snow,

People ignoring the melting snow, only bothering to step on the fresh snow,

Forcing themselves to believe that it’s all the same snow.

I dropped it,

My grip slipped on the precious snowglobe,

I watched as it fall,

And it broke.

The globe is struggling to keep up,

The iciness of the single patch of snow blinding everyone’s sight,

Making them unsure of what they’re right in front of,

Losing sight of how the snow’s starting to fall even more slowly giving pain,

Shattered in a million pieces,

Laying on the ground,

I watch hopelessly,

As the glitter seeps into the ground, staining it with water.

It’s fragile,

Easy to take,

One slip up and everything comes tumbling down,

The glitter that once used to linger in the air is sinking into the soil, polluting it.

I never cleaned it up myself,

My mother did that for me,

The shards are too sharp, was what my mother would say,

As she wiped the floor.

Nobody’s taking the blame for what they did,

When they’re all at fault,

Not bothering to clean up the broken pieces of the globe,

Around the world, nobody’s volunteering to wipe the floor.

II. Princess/Prince Dolls

When I was younger,

I used to love these dolls that I got every birthday,

That came with full on accessories and dresses,

I would dress them up in various gowns and hairstyles.

Women are often considered weaker than men,

Men are often considered having to be stronger than women,

Each gender not creating the balance they want,

Then when will we get to the middle?

Then I started wondering,

Why do girl dolls always come with gowns,

And why do boy dolls always come with pants and prince-y suits?

What was the difference?

How come each gender’s perfect job is assumed stereotypically,

Not asking for the opinion of the person itself,

Not inputting every variable into the solution,

Only coming up with a part-time solution itself.

Why did the girl dolls’ feet only fit on the heels,

And why did the heels not fit on boy dolls?

I learned to differentiate between the two,

While playing with dolls.

It often makes me confused,

About how gender inequality is still happening right now,

When so many people are advocating against it,

The world is still full of the stereotypical thin girl dolls and the muscular boy dolls.

The girl dolls that were allowed to gossip with their friends,

And the boy dolls that were allowed to play sports with their friends,

None intertwining with the other,

Even if one did stand up for the other.

Never achieving a balance in between the middle,

No achieving a complete 50/50,

Always one oblique to the other,

Please tell me what’s the difference that’s so important between girl dolls and boy dolls.

III. Black Tea

I once accidentally left a cup of tea out in the snow in my backyard,

The next day when we came back,

It was all frozen,

All solid and rigid.

There are many types of people on Earth,

Many types with many many more personalities,

Everyone’s different,

And yet we’re all still the same type of drink—tea.

I wanted to get a new black tea since my green tea was frozen,

“No,”

Was what my friend told me,

“The black tea looks horrible.”

It’s so unfair,

How we’re all being treated differently just because our appearances,

Our personalities judged based on our looks,

On what color tea we are.

I look at my friend in disgust,

I can’t believe my ears.

“You never drank black tea before,”

Is what I retort with.

We all say that we’re going to fix this,

That we’re going to maintain balance, without any bias,

But then why are people still favoring one tea over the other?

The “better” one left treated well while the “worse” one being treated like it isn’t even tea.

My friend shrugged,

“I never said it tastes horrible.”

She never tested out the tea,

She never knew how it was like,

Try to get the full scope,

Before we ever say anything harmful or hurtful,

As you shouldn’t judge by skin colors,

But instead the taste of the tea.

I went back into my house without another word,

Got black tea,

And handed it to her,

“Try it.”