How on Earth | Teen Ink

How on Earth

July 5, 2012
By samasparagus SILVER, Riverside, Illinois
samasparagus SILVER, Riverside, Illinois
5 articles 0 photos 12 comments

Favorite Quote:
&quot;&#039;Good. Illegal is always faster.&#039;&quot;<br /> -Eoin Colfer


"He doesn't understand"
she muttered,
eyes stuck tight
to bricks.

"He thinks he's funny",
in her eyes
the glimmer of
sick shame.

"Our culture",
she explained,
"is beautiful
and clean."

She didn't want to learn-
the language of her parents.

Her resilient eyes of brown-
were plaited with the floor.

They sent her far away-
with English-deaf relations.

And brought her back alive-
with an ethnic speckled tongue.

By then well versed in pollo-
the only meal devoured.

The foreign wonders opened-
teacup world expanded thrice.

How could she always know
how on earth to understand?


The author's comments:
I wrote this about my friend who was upset that a kid was making fun of Mexican culture although he was of Mexican descent. She herself had not understood the importance of her heritage when she was little and her parents sent her to Mexico with her extended family to learn. I explore in this poem how people discover things at different times and in different ways.

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