Untitled, Michelle Asciote

Even though you think you see me I am hidden
Although you say you hear me
You're not understanding me
You say that I am strong
Why do I feel so weak?
I am told that I am confident
Why do you belittle me?
You say that I am different but
I feel like a stereotype
Even though I stand tall I feel so small...
Don't act so different around me
Fearing you might upset me
I can't take everything you've thrown at me
But I'll keep on swinging after you've finished
I may not be everything you so blindly believe me to be
One thing you've forgotten
One thing I pride myself on
is heart
I know how to love, like I loved you
I have compassion, but I can't keep feeling for you
But I will continue
Most of all
I know how to forgive
Just like I've forgiven you

A Place to Continue Wishing, joanna vogel

America is not a place you would call
a homeland.
You cannot squeeze good folktales
out of three hundred
years and apple pie
topped with cheese
or grow a proper fruit tree
from cement.

The streets of New York do not smell
like the folds in your mother’s skirt
or the stray tobacco leaves in your
grandfather’s shirt pocket.
And, if these streets do sound
like a kitchen;
bursting with aunties wielding
wooden spoons, mother dressed
in the apron with frayed
strings
and a patch beneath the pocket,
you cannot understand what they are saying.
America is the place
you go to dream
about the old country, to remember
the homeland, and a place
to continue wishing.

I Would Like To Lose, Jonathan Mendoza

I would like to lose… I would like to lose… Honestly, I don't know where to begin. Being someone who was born with cerebral palsy, I've always dreamed, not of losing, but of gaining something. Gaining the freedom to run and run until it feels like flying, gaining the freedom to glide upon that shimmering coat of ice in the middle of winter.

Losing what I was born with would completely change my life. Sometimes I don't know if that's good or bad. My hunger for reading and my drive to write has always come from what I don't have; that seemingly unreachable goal.

In some ways my disability is a gift; something that makes me want to reach beyond my boundaries and ignore limitations. You see, even though I might be physically disabled, I've always pushed my mind to the limit, imagining what life would be like on the other side of the looking glass and striving to do the best with what I have.

I think that losing my disability would sap my drive. It might prevent me from looking and thinking outside the box, because there won't be a box anymore. I know I sound crazy, but losing my disability, would be like losing a part of me. Losing all the memories, and all the experiences I've had, tucked away with me in my little box world.

Never Forgotten, Ginny Georgekutty

Never Shall I forget that time when words became a weapon.
Never Shall I forget the moment his face popped out of the window with such hatred against us.
Never Shall I forget that night, a darkness that greeted my sister and I with dirt and pebbles that scraped our faces.
Never Shall I forget the fear I saw transfixed in my sister’s eyes.
Never Shall I forget his words that brought shame onto our identity.
Never Shall I forget the eyes cast down, silent yet fearful as they kept walking,
Never Shall I forget how powerless we were to stop it.

Never Shall I forget the silence that filled the air with our hopes that he would disappear

Nor

the words of an elder to simply walk the other way and ignore him.

Never Shall I forget those moments even now, years after he has vanished.

Never.