I am Daugther of...

I am daughter of

housewives, bankers, doctors,

teachers, nurses, salesclerks,

musicians, painters, writers.

I haven’t seen my father a long time

I know his destination will be unknown to me

we don’t talk, we don’t speak

we only dream, we dream our own dream separately

lost on our own thoughts, lost on our own lives,

we lost everything in the hands of time.

I’ve heard where my parents met for the first time

working together in the Hong Kong bank.

They came from very different place, and a very different family

between the two islands in Asia - Macao and Hong Kong,

were separated by the water that could cross by a boat.

I’ve seen my mother cried so many times

of loneliness and in the darkness she cried,

her eyes filled with so many untouched tears

of so many tombs she had visited.

She came into the United States

alone and worried,

with two small children by her side,

looking for a new beginning, starting over in a new city.

With new language to be learn,

with new tradition and culture to get use to,

with a new future to look forward to,

she made it, we all made it on our own ways.

Unknown destiny, unknown dream,

she imagined things that she couldn’t see,

hoping for better place to live.

She worked hard all her life,

she brought food to us every night.

To me doesn’t really matter where I came from

or who my parents were -

Asians, Europeans, Africans or South Americans -

What really matter is that

I am what I am,

and is gonna be alright,

if I become my own person in the end.