Invitation PS
By Fong Tran

I live with invisible holes in my body
gigantic voids
dug open with lost unanswered curiosity
engaped with questions marks about

where               I’m from
who                  I am
what                 I could of been

are trend marks of absent knowledge
scarred with me forever

these holes in my body
forced in between my organs
are soccer ball bounce back walls
these sometimes “how you doing” phonecalls
ripped open with missing parent teacher meetings
and child can’t support you checks in the mail

this void in me
grew deeper
every single day
till the moment I was asked
“so what does your father do for a living?”
I grew completely hollow
inside out
til the only thing that existed
were my words
“um…I don’t really have a father”

“don’t really” meant
I don’t have father
and lets not talk about it
and these “don’t really’s”’ manifested
inside in between the wrinkles of my brains
squeezed through the crevasses of my intestines
and it seep out in my blood stream
to implode hearts from within

these “don’t really’s” really meant
was that I’ve been keeping this

shit inside of me for way too long
and I want to do is a write a poem
to tell the whole damn world

“don’t really” is  

a smoking alcoholic man that
gave birth to me
he gave birth to me but
abandoned my Vietnam refugee family
left this California
went to all the way over there Florida
for his other wife and kids
took our business/money/ and sanity
for his new family future
and never looked back

“don’t really” meant
never had
never needed

Needing fathers became absolute

because
I learned early in my life
that I don’t need to
follow the footsteps of a man
to become one
I don’t need to
follow the footsteps of another man
I will make my own

I would bury this old void
with older sister wisdom
beautiful mother hard work love
Full House would never sense to me

because I didn’t have no Danny tanner

or uncle Jessie giving me lessons of the day
it was the Womyn in my life
that made this young warrior
 

I cemented wholes over
with report card celebration dinners
tense passenger seats licenses
and hot prepared Tupperware
for cold college refrigerators

I cover them
with certificate award walls
medal dangling ribbons off
trophy shining pedestals

And diplomas that read
University of California, Berkeley

Bachelors of Arts in Social Welfare
Double Minor in Education and Public Policy

Department Award for Community Service

And I proclaim these words as I read these words
so I can never be a outcome
of another abandoned father

and there will be a day
that I tell “don’t really” 

That the void you put in me
would become the armor
the strength
the will
in me and for that
you at least deserve this

“this was your ticket for my college graduation”
______________________________________________________________________________

 Reclaim History/ Reclaim Self
By Fong Tran

Once upon a Vietnam War
single mother of three
left rice paddles and fabric patches
for dream escapes to land of golden arches
with babies on her back
she left on Oregon trails with no reset buttons
as she trekked through miles of
flooded land mine terrain
hidden in the camflouage of blackness of the midnight
she quietly evades the silhouettes of the moon
and the ears of communist scouts
she dodges sky blotting dropped bombs

and circus flying gun fire from every direction

to finally have
reached oil rekey fish boats
that stuffed people under decks like stuffed sardines
marinated in salt water, urine and
tears of grown men
lost out at sea till the tip of starvation
a starvation that would eat at her own body
a starvation that would starve her children
and hearts would implode
as she watched her youngest baby almost die
in her own arms

(chorus)Long ago, mama where you
 let your whole life and soul

Raised your child from broken home
coming where your from your from

Yes I know, mama that this story will go untold

But with this very song, Imma write your soul

Coming where I’m from I’m from (chorus)

left landed and stranded on unmarked
refugee camp territories in the Philippines
made listen robotic English teaching earphones
that was more robot the teaching
made push medical syringes that we syringe
than medical
made shallow rice porridge that was
more poor than rice
8 months were never so long

but she finally
made it to America
in Stockton, CA
she was ship wrecked in one room apartment cramped
with another family of seven
her 3 kids, her 80 dollars and her 1 hope

would be just enough for her to
make in these new alien lands
and 1 year later this woman
this mother
would have me as a son

her second generation son

(chorus)

you see these stories
is one of many

that have slipped the

tongues of many of our ancestors
people that have struggled and sacrificed
not only the Vietnamese
but the Mien, Hmong, Lao, Cham, Khmer
our folks left their homelands
so their dreams for our freedom would never die

to my southeast Asian brothers and sisters

realize our people came of this way thru
Political persecution, Secret CIA wars and ethnic genocide
They were POW’s
not prisoners of war

but refugee camps were prison of warriors
we are the descendants of guerrilla soldiers and survivors
our bloodlines run deep like the Majestic Mekong river
our histories rise high like

the mountains of the Hmong

our strength is buried in the pot holes of the Cambodian killing fields

we stand on these privileged gold rich grounds
our identities sometimes lost, conflicted, wavered unsure
we must find foundation in our families histories
only then can we find ourselves

most pure