Tibetan-American Anxieties: Wanting Sounds in a Barren Throat

Lhabab Duchen¹ brought the red robed gathering,
And with smiles, I welcomed them silently.

Behind my teeth squirmed an orphan tongue,
Abandoned by its mother long ago.

With the awe of a mute, I watched them unpack
The silnyen², the rolmo³, the gyaling⁴.

Back then I couldn’t even read the pecha⁵
To fill my empty lips with sound.

I escaped from the shrine to the heat of the kitchen –
Scurrying aunts and silverware trays.

Ama la⁶, I know I have to serve the tea. Please don’t scold me;
My identity is unstable.

In a guest laden living room to the side in a corner,
I tried to wear a coat like skin,

And in that moment, that precise moment, I’m asked,
“Are you Tibetan?”

Crushed to bits by a gravitational vortex,
My heart slammed through the floor and the septic.

Hiding in the bathroom to “fix my hair.”
Mirror, show me a yak not an eagle.

In the frigid Snow Land in a steaming tent,
A nomad family drinks thukpa⁷ together.

Their brilliant smiles gleam in my eyes,
An outsider looking in on their happiness.

¹  Festival of the Buddha’s Descent from Heaven
²  Tibetan cymbals played for peaceful ritual practices
³  Tibetan cymbals played for wrathful ritual practices
⁴  Tibetan woodwind instrument used in ritual practices
⁵  Tibetan scripture
⁶  Eng. Respected Mother
⁷  Tibetan noodle soup

A Little Fear