Who Am I?

I say welcome! As my first post, I will be releasing a new poem. It’s an “I am” poem, so that y’all get to know me a little bit. Usually, I don’t like to give descriptions before I read or post pieces, but I am making the rare exception for y’all.

This poem is the second poem I wrote after being laid off. The first poem was way more tragic, so I’ll spare y’all some of that. With this poem, I wanted to get out the idea of the things that I am letting go of, of people I felt at some point I needed to become. In framing myself as not these things, I can clearly focus on the things I do want to be. It’s short, and I hope y’all enjoy it. Any and all feedback is welcomed.

Who Am I?

I am not a gardener or a
painter, or a mechanic, or an
activist, or a news anchor, or
not an actor, or a nurse, or a cook,
or a therapist, or firefighter, or
a stock trader, or a doctor, or
a grave digger, or a grave robber,
or a regular robber, or a bank
robber, or a thief, not a game designer,
or a graphic designer, or a
fashion designer, or a fisherman,
or a priest, or a miracle worker,
not even myself,
as cells within me shift, as old ideas
decay, as this planet dies, as
my grandparents died,
wiped out by a global pandemic,
so too were their stories evaporated,
as did this moment,
gone.

I am not a bracero, an H1
visa holder, or a person
crazy enough to penetrate one
of the most militarized borders
in the world.
My parents are that though,
finding holes in walls,
and in bureaucracies.
I am not my parents, or
my brother, or my niblings,
I am not a migrant detained
in one of the over 30,000 bed required
by the U.S. government to be filled by
the Department of Homeland Security.
I am not a victim,
or someone who victimizes,
or stretches the truth, or even
tells the truth all the time.
I am not a judge, a jury, but
I might be an executioner,
who knows what crimes the
government denies doing
in my name.
I am not innocent,
I am not innocent,
or guilty, or maybe
I am.

I am not who I think I am,
because I am, who I am,
and who I am, is not who
I was, or who I will be
or won’t be.
I am not my wounds,
or my scars, or the lessons
learned, in fact, I am not this
poem, or these words, because
by the time they reach you,
I will be someone completely
different.

I am in fact, grateful,
for coffee, oxygen, this rock we’re on
being the exact distance it is from our sun,
the way that I have come to love
my own laughter,
and my family, because
I am not a monster,
no matter how many times
I tell myself that I am.