When You Ask Me Where I'm Going Read online

  Dedication

  to ishleen

  and all the other kids

  who seldom see themselves

  in books

  there is nothing gentle about these poems.

  even the flowers dripping from my tongue

  sharpen their edges on glass. douse

  themselves in propane. prepare their

  petals for war.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  skin (n)

  muscle (n)

  lung (n)

  nerve (n)

  heart (n)

  light (n)

  Notes

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Praise

  Books by Jasmin Kaur

  Back Ad

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  skin (n)

  the outermost layer of a body. a sheathing. an organ.

  a protective covering. a composition of dead cells that

  comprises most of the dust within a home. that which is

  seen first. that which hides the rest. a wall between the earth

  and my soft psyche. an unmissable thing. a curious thing.

  a shameless thing. a migratory thing. an organic human

  history. a burning building your eyes roam. a neon sign.

  an altar for worship. the place where we first met. a beacon

  of light. a blaring siren system. a kind of refuge at the very

  edge of a cliff.

  and what is it about the skin?

  it’s where they draw all their conclusions.

  my skin (and everything carried on it) is the firstmeyou

  will encounter unless you’re meeting my words before you’ve

  met my face

  if that’s the case, i’m excited. it means that this is one of

  those rare and beautiful moments when everything inside of

  me is going to matter more than everything outside of me.

  this neighborhood is hushed whispers from those who will

  only graze her perimeter. this neighborhood is clean-cut,

  harmless houses and the stifled stories they are home to. this

  neighborhood is a surveillance camera made for children

  tangled up in something hollow while their parents

  are tangled up in money for the mortgage. husbands

  who smile for their wives. wives who cry for their sons.

  because of their sons. because of their daughters. and

  sometimes because of their husbands. this neighborhood

  is an unwanted migration of punjab to the promise of

  soil fertile enough to replant roots. this neighborhood

  is twelve hours sifting through berries and hours more

  hoping that aching backs and hands and minds will one

  day come to fruition. this neighborhood is a white woman

  who tells me that i live in a dangerous place but that

  it should be fine for people like me. this neighborhood

  shouts. and throbs. and breaks. but she has never failed to

  plant hope.

  call us concrete children

  broken by the cracks

  in the sidewalkchildren

  or turned out okay

  despite the oddschildren

  call us unworthy children.

  born on the wrong parallel

  of the wrong side of the earthchildren

  call us unteachable immigrantchildren

  or angry brownchildren

  or your success storychildren

  or

  simply

  call us children.

  so that for once

  that is what we are

  allowed to be.

  inspired by tupac shakur’s

  “the rose that grew from concrete”

  some boys

  break boys who

  look just like them

  because somewhere

  along the line

  they were taught that

  when they are hurt

  someone else

  must hurt more

  and the cops know

  their stories to begin

  and end with

  bullets escaping guns.

  or weed exchanging

  hands. or their clothing.

  or their skin.

  but i’ve seen what

  they tuck behind their

  locked-door eyes.

  the way their mouths

  harden up before they

  cry.

  / sabar / patience

  some mothers wear patience

  far too gracefully.

  it is the shawl draped over

  her shoulders every time her son

  walks out the front door with no

  regard for the ones still suffocating

  in this house

  it is the scarf calmly covering

  her headhiding the black dahlias

  on her neck

  it is the intricate pashmina wrapped

  around her body when i see her catching

  tears in cloth or hiding bloodshot eyes

  behind the protection of her chuni

  or wiping all the sadness away with the

  very thing that she refuses to remove.

  product recall

  in this world

  worth is defined by the way

  poreless skin stretches across

  correctly chiseled bone

  by the places where

  fat strategically stores itself

  by the obedience we hold against

  our own heads—safety removed

  as we discard all the pieces of us

  that do not fit within the plastic mold.

  / pakka rang / ripened color

  when they whisper that

  the heat of her mother’s womb

  must have turned her skin to ash

  she laughs

  because they cannot see all the god

  in a body draped in earth and fire

  and gold all at once.

  an open letter to south asians

  but what if you get dark

  is to say that dark bodies don’t let light in

  is to say that there is something dirty

  about the biological makeup of skin

  is to say that some people are born clean

  and need to keep it that way

  is to say that you don’t hate black people

  but you thank god you weren’t born one.

  so roop stares into the bathroom mirror and

  prepares her face for a fistfight. the foundation

  is two shades too light, so she does her best to

  smoothly blend it into her neck. her mom walks

  in and wanders her skin with her eyes. and her

  grandma walks in and nods. and her aunt walks in

  and tells her that the guests have arrived. the guests

  are polite. they talk about the family’s health. they

  talk about the price of houses. they talk about the

  leadership race. but they don’t talk about roop’s face.

  and nothing good or bad is noted of her. and this

  time, it seems as if the camouflage has worked.

  i’m trying to settle into my body

  feel comfortable inside its walls

  stay long enough to decorate each room

  sit at peace within me

  i’m trying to come home to myself

  i really am

  but you underestimate the wayeyes

  can knock on doors and br
eak through

  windows and tear down foundations

  how eyes can whisper and laugh

  and scream

  you underestimate the way hate

  can pull me to tears and push me to leave

  once again.

  kes (n)

  the uncut hair kept by sikhs as a means of

  recognizing the divinity within one’s natural form.

  an expression of love. a sense of freedom from

  the ideals of consumeristic and eurocentric beauty

  sunday.

  you catch the corner of a mirror

  and can’t help but notice the strand

  of hair. always bolder. always louder

  than before but you tell yourself that

  there are flowers growing from your skin.

  monday.

  the train is a cacophony of beings.

  humans as lost and hopeful as you

  and you can’t help but weave stories

  of their struggles between each stop

  but their eyes drown in your sight.

  he glares.

  you smile back.

  tuesday.

  you find yourself consumed with glass.

  rectangles and squares and prisms and

  shards that are always painful no matter

  the dullness of the edges.

  wednesday.

  she turns to you in class. after months

  of small talk she musters up the nerve to say

  do you mind if i ask you a question?

  you nod. you already know what it is.

  thursday.

  you’re trying to hide from glass.

  but your body was not made only

  to run. what if you slowed your

  pace long enough to listen to

  your skin?

  friday.

  you stumble upon a mirror.

  but before you can escape you catch

  your eye on a glimmer of light.

  there is something glowing

  just beneath the surface

  of the being before you.

  saturday.

  you crown yourself.

  this time taller

  this time willfully

  you seek all the stories

  locked within each

  softened layer of cloth

  wrapped around your

  head.

  today, these stories are enough.

  sunday.

  you encounter flowers

  scattered across your skin

  for the first time, you stop

  to sit among them.

  woman

  with scandalized eyes

  turns away from me and

  speaks to her friend

  speaks to me

  in all the silent ways that matter

  says

  thick brows are okay

  but messy brows are notsays

  this must be part of

  my culturesays

  she is sorry about

  my culture

  says there is

  one way to be

  a woman

  and this is

  not it.

  inspired by key ballah’s

  “for the loves of my life”

  the ideal sikh girl

  only radiates grace

  across her hairless face

  she is born with so little

  in need of fixing

  that they will stare

  deciding whether or not

  her form has been altered

  until the corner of her eye

  catches the heat of

  theirgaze

  when they finally realize

  that it is only nature

  who has been so kind to her

  they will no longer hide

  the hunger in their eyes

  as they inform her that

  she is beautiful.

  i’m not here to be your example of the good girl

  until i’m your warning sign for the wayward one

  / nooh / daughter-in-law

  her mother repeats a familiar invocation

  recites the words that have already gone

  stale in her mouth

  treat her no differently than you would treat me

  remember that they are your family now

  their home is your real home

  but it is not yours

  do not overstep their bounds

  or let your tongue get comfortable

  they are yours and they are not

  they are yours but they will not

  love you despite it all

  and so she leaves to

  not her home.

  babygirl

  didn’t your mother

  ever teach you

  that when these hips

  widen into the earth’s arch,

  this body will no longer be yours?

  you will be baptized into womanhood

  by all the eyes that own you.

  on trial

  girl no older than thirteen

  stares up into the eyes

  of humanity

  and apologizes

  for the gaze of men

  humanity

  no jury to be blinded

  by a bleeding heart

  remains unconvinced

  of her sincerity.

  my name is not sheilabut i’m wondering if

  i have the right to a jawanior a life all

  in which i am not pulled aparthip by hip.

  in bollywooda woman is meant to remain

  calmwhile fifty-three men encircle her with

  mouths wateringjust as calm as she must

  remainin each of these streetswhere her

  compliance keeps her alive. munni badnaam

  huibut her attackers still walk the streets

  honor intactbecause every single day in

  the world’s largest democracy™the word

  izzat takes precedence over the testimonies of

  ninety-fivewomenand god knows how

  many other whose voices have been stifled.

  when durga stepped out into the battlefield

  her oppressors’ heads hanging from her neck

  i wonder if she was met with respector whether they viewed her skin as a land that hadn’t yet been conquered.

  down aisle six

  on a shelf that’s not too hard to reach

  is barbie.

  packaged in pretreated plastic

  barbie has a propensity for promiscuity

  all the features they want of her:

  lips full, hips curved, eyes bright

  barbie’s arms don’t bend but

  she can get down on her knees

  made to please those with

  a moment’s attention

  she is

  labeled, branded, and set on display

  waiting rigidly for ken to glance

  in her direction

  trying to fill that hollow space

  between molded layers of peach plastic

  but can you really blame her?

  she didn’t place herself

  in that box.

  they taught her that

  hell existed at the curve

  of her waist. because the

  shape of her body left

  boys wanting. tempted

  them like apples

  hanging from

  trees. like fruit that

  wanted to be picked.

  made their minds wander.

  left too much to the imagination.

  too little to the imagination.

  he taught her that hell existed

  in the hourglass of her being

  in the small of her back

  in the movement of her legs

  when he invaded her because

  the sin was too tempting

  and she prayed for

  forgiveness.

  boys with m
icrophones

  love to talk about queens

  love to separate the humans

  from the hoes

  love to sexualize

  the intelligence of women

  love to tell you that you are

  not like the other women

  love to praise women

  so women will

  want them.

  / kode-svich / code-switch

  why should my tongue

  choke on itself for my

  intelligence to be proven?

  i will not call my voice colloquial

  when yours is always welcome in its natural form.

  my words nach between two languages fighting over them.

  my thoughts travel the earth before i collect them.

  and if they need to be described in a boli that sounds

  barbaric to ears that don’t know how to hold them

  so be it. i will not italicize all the parts of myself

  that make no sense to you.

  you are the wrong kind of writer. the kind that doesn’t

  always have the right words and seldom has them in

  the right order. your commas pretend to be periods

  and your metaphors sometimes spill over the edges of

  convention. you sit in bookstores cross-legged at the

  bottom of the shelves. love too many of the books and

  take none of them home. your lines don’t usually fill up

  the entire page and your english teacher usually fails

  you for not fleshing out your thoughts. most times,

  there just aren’t enough words. there are enough stories,

  but there sure as hell aren’t enough words. you don’t have

  snap-worthy sentiments about love but you know what it

  is to fall asleep during a graveyard shift and lay awake

  for hours waiting for no one to come home. the english

  is still unkind. still scrapes the bottom of your tongue

  on its way out and the metal on your pencil still scrapes

  the paper where the eraser is worn. you tell me all the

  stories, sitting cross-legged at the bottom of the shelves.

  you think they will never find their way into the stacks

  above us unless another hand scribes them. one without

  so many calluses. one more familiar with poignancy than