Inside Out & Back Again

by Thanhhà Lại

Who can go against a mother who has become gaunt like bark from raising four children alone?

Black seeds spill like clusters of eyes, wet and crying.

The first hot bite of freshly cooked rice, plump and nutty, makes me imagine the taste of ripe papaya although one has nothing to do with the other.

Mother says, People share when they know they have escaped hunger. Shouldn’t people share because there is hunger?

What’s the point of new shirts and sandals if you lose the last tangible remnant of love?

Just like that Mother amends our faith, saying all beliefs are pretty much the same.

Whoever invented English must have loved snakes.

People living on others’ goodwill cannot afford political opinions.

So much for rules! Whoever invented English should be bitten by a snake.

I step back, hating pity, having learned from Mother that the pity giver feels better, never the pity receiver.

Mostly I wish I were still smart.

I’m practicing to be seen.

I pout, but MiSSSisss WaSShington says every language has annoyances and illogical rules, as well as sensible beauty.

thought so, despite her own rule Mother can’t help yearning for Father any more than I can help tasting ripe papaya in my sleep.

Whoever invented English should have learned to spell.

No one would believe me but at times I would choose wartime in Saigon over peacetime in Alabama.

Mother strokes my head. Chant, my child, Breathe in, peaceful mind. Breathe out, peaceful smile. She strokes my back. Chant, my daughter; your whispers will bloom and shelter you from words you need not hear.

Oh, my daughter, at times you have to fight, but preferably not with your fists.

Father won’t leave if we hold on to him. If you feel like crying, think at least now we know. At least we no longer live in waiting.

MiSSSisss WaSShington says if every learner waits to speak perfectly, no one would learn a new language.

Our lives will twist and twist, intermingling the old and the new until it doesn’t matter which is which.

This year I hope I truly learn to fly-kick, not to kick anyone so much as to fly.