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Out With Mom

I am careful with my words unless they are not in English, / am I not? (不好意識打擾各位可是我不想再禮貌了。) / My mother is careful with her words only when they are in English.

By Rebecca Pinwei Tseng
Poetry | Poetry Tuesday, Rebecca Tseng, poetry
February 5, 2019

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

God is bilingual, bitch!
God is bilingual, trilingual, omnilingual
[This is
especially at the airport and mall [ American Air American Air ]

Don’t tell us to speak not this way I am
to speak the way I am.

要說就說大聲一點啊 給我聽 再說,再說

[Scene: my mother leaves the scene, leaves me in stand-off
with the lady in the shoe store. 老外不喜歡我們講中文,
she whispers 老外 even in American Air and so I say
this time, I’ll stay, in this new director’s cut in which
I am the director –

CUT. Too late & Scene. She leaves with her mother, leaves
the lady triumphant. Leaves her mother’s mouth behind,
a warm, gaping hole shrinking with shame into the floor.]

給我聽 再說,再見

so
God is a bilingual bitch.

Made a world swallow its split mouth so slow we have to
drag our feet in its spittle. Aliens are sad static dustbunnies with no ears
and too much hair. Tower of Babel is a gaggle of blond babes
being loudly welcomed into 亞洲, an Instagram post of shiny,
shiny teeth.

I am careful with my words unless they are not in English,
am I not? (不好意識打擾各位可是我不想再禮貌了。)
My mother is careful with her words only when they are in English.

Somewhere in the Nevada desert there is  a colony of  colonized happy  aliens who  then
colonize the floor with their dangerous, dusty patterns that no one knows what each one
means  but they manage to make a little家 that  is  always  under  observation  ,  so   xiao
xing! 。The government reports they are extremely content but that is  the quota,  folks,
erase, and we say okay, thank you for your time.