When the Limit Does Not Exist

Herman Hesse wrote,

“We are not going in circles,

we are going upwards.

The path is a spiral;

we have already climbed many steps.”

I am dedicating my present to witnessing

The climb

But in any moment where we take stock to reassess,

We must work backwards.

What will follow are scavenged bits from different notebooks I wrote in age 17 to now.

There are bits about Blackness, but it’s mainly about existence.

Consider these words to be the multiplicity of my whorls.

June 27th, 2015

This cosmic body formed in the haze of amorphous gases,

Not even clashes of different star classes could prevent its creation.

But it has been met with confusion

Because of the ways atomic fusion

formed its color, shape, and brightness,

Rendering it unreliable for classification.

And so this body has

Remained

A miscegenation of perhaps unknown proportions,

That distorts the expectant and hesitant space around it.

January 11th 2018

The beauty and curse of these multiplicitous,

impermissible permutations,

These ethnically infinite bodies

Made of fluid air and sunlight,

Which are nestled in the

Infinite Blackness of Unknowable Space

Is that despite all effort,

A neat boundary

Between what is

And isn’t starlight

Can never be clearly

Marked with precision.

June 27th, 2015

In the universe I have created for myself

Decorated for myself

Made vast and vivid

because it’s been

my universe

and I want to make a real home for myself

Life has thrown me twists and turns

And has burned

Me

June 21st 2017 Age 18

They print a box

For me to fit in

If I limit myself to one

It cuts me off

From my kin

My Blood

Pumps

Through thick roots

I’ll have no more freedom if I choose

No more breathing in

vast

Open

space

Just claustrophobic places

Where

everything

is

simple

February 10th, 2016 Age 17

I don’t want to stare my sorrow in the face, but I’m going to do it anyway.

Confusion abounding,

Blackness surrounding

And emanating from

me;

but I can’t recognize myself

in the darkness

My face obliterates

A quarter of my lineage.

The world sees

A visage

That betrays an Asian heritage

I don’t connect to or really understand.

June 27th, 2015

And no one has ever mapped it

Or trapped it

Or cracked the lid of this

Steaming pot,

This universe,

But others have gazed in and shifted it,

Shifted me.

January 19, 2016 (Age 17)

I’ve found the beauty of New York City in the small things:

pizza at 5 a.m. with your friends,

turning a corner to discover breathtaking architecture

I’ve never noticed before,

And the fact that all denizens expect the unexpected

Which includes me

In all my mutt-y and mixed up messy heritage

This place understands un-belonging.

June 27th, 2015

And given time,

My permutation will sputter out,

And the genes will efface me

And my ilk,

But

Nothing

Is

Ever

gone.

I’ll leave traces of moondust somewhere:

A river underfoot,

A leaf on a tree.

Proof that I don’t and never did need remembrance,

Just acceptance in my present

Space and Time

Because the beauty of these multiplicitous,

impermissible permutations

These ethnically infinite

combinations

of fluid air and sunlight

Which have been nestled

in the Infinite and Unknowable Blackness of Space

Is that we’ll never know,

truly,

What is and isn’t starlight.