MArk Maza
SPOILER ALERT: THERE ARE GHOSTS IN THIS POEM
In a cyberpunk future
where the dark billowed
smoke of clouds
are an extended metaphor for
a 20th century mistake,
and their cries streak
like rich-struck-oil
onto the metal and concrete
gritty we house ourselves in.
As the neon pink moonlight
peeks between blinds
and glows a bedroom into a waking streetlamp
under the 2,040th night in
a futuristic Tokyo that is still trying to
stomach a calm between tradition
and industry
with a culture as Paleolithic
as hands, long dead,
molding clay into mirrors
reflecting faces
that are at most: Asian
and at most: Japanese
would make one wonder:
Why does the main cyborg police officer in very Asian Tokyo look like Scarlet Johansson?
And every Japanese resident
in this trailer is directed to act like that’s normal.
Like we are being conditioned to watch
another white body be better
at being Asian than the actual Asian
people around her. She wall runs like
she invented it. Cocks a gun and pulls
the trigger like it’s her skin’s inheritance.
Headshots erase henchmen,
who are at most: Japanese
and at most: Asian,
from existence.
Her character, Mira Killian, gets to
reach across an ocean and bleach
“Motoko Kusanagi” from the
Japanese tongue
then instruct that tongue
how to pronounce her American
name correctly.
Even in the superpowered idealized
future in very Asian Tokyo, we are
only good at being the sidekick,
the scientist,
the old-wise sage,
the geisha,
the villain,
the victim,
the women—a fetishized fuck trapped in a refrigerator
to be consumed now or displayed later
and then disappeared,
the men—in various stages of dying or teaching
and then disappeared. We still need to be saved.
Still need to be a caricature. Our hands can’t
possibly handle our own stories--
that Hollywood continues to Columbus.
-----------------
A SEAT AT THE TABLE
Long Duc Dong is
half-Chinese,
half-Vietnamese,
all-Asian,
full of teenage angst and emotion,
foreign exchange student
living in an all-white picket fence house,
in an all-white suburb,
with an all-white family,
eating some bland-ass food
with an all-white name, like quiche,
trying to survive the interrogation
of all the white faces
with bright-ass smiles
desperate for his yellow foreign tongue
to confirm
that the taste
translates between oceans.
He tells them nothing.
Instead
he presses play on the stereo,
increases the volume to undeniable
and waits for Public Enemy’s Chuck D.
to scald their fragile white ears off.
He reaches into his book bag
pulls out a fresh bottle of Kikkoman and Sriracha
and bathes the quiche in it
until the aroma from his mother’s house
geysers out of the meal
and steams it into xiu mai.
He snaps chopsticks down the center
rubs them together,
takes one bite of the new and improved meal,
and excitedly hands a full plate and chopsticks to Molly
instructing her to pass it around
in a perfect
all-white accent
that silks out of his mouth
and into the perked-up ears
of the white-accented
who are looking at each other,
eager to figure out who gets
to be the first one
to compliment him on his English
today.
Long presses his palms onto the table,
lifts himself up,
grunts like he’s been carrying a railroad on his shoulders
and marvels at how quick his handprint evaporates from the table.
He walks out the front door.
Steps onto the paved
streets of white suburbia
and almost gets clipped by a speeding GMC DeLorean.
An old white man
in a white lab coat
with white strands of hair on his head
that sway Woodstock with the wind,
and a scrawny, white, teenage kid
rush out of the car to check on him.
The old man hurriedly asks,
Hey kid, are you alright? Are you okay?
But it sounds less like English
and more like, dog-chewing-on-the-morning-newspaper.
Long’s Casio rings to remind him he’s late for school.
He says, Yes
and grabs the keys from the old man,
pushes the kid out of the way,
and drives off in his new car.
the teenage kid turns to the old man and asks,
Doc, what happened?
The old man, shocked into stillness,
replies with a pale complement:
I don’t know, Marty.
He just spoke English so well.
The kid, in complete disbelief,
rubs his forehead and replies,
This is heavy.
Long parallel parks perfectly
into an open space at Theodore Roosevelt High School
and leaves the engine running.
He walks the white halls of his school,
passing the bust of an old white dead man they worship,
and steps into his classroom.
He notices Greg, Jake, Josh, Barbara and the rest of his bullies,
whose mouths have chewed and grinded
the name his mother and father gave him
down to a slur,
are all sitting in
one
long
row
with pale cheeks like a blank canvas
and Long is an artist giving into inspiration
and his hand is a paint brush.
He charges down the row
(like he is outrunning the possibility that a teacher is right behind him)
and he slaps the color into each one of them.
Long realizes he’s got a lot of work to do,
rushes to the DeLorean
fiddling with all the buttons and knobs
and drives 88MPH
to 1960,
kidnaps
Mickey Rooney playing Mr. Yunioshi,
and drops him off in 1942
just in time for breakfast
at Manzanar.
The DeLorean malfunctions
and Long is sent further back in time.
He finds himself in the middle of a war
between Vikings and white-European invaders.
Long pulls out a lawn chair from the trunk of his car
and microwaves some popcorn,
sits down and watches
the world’s first white-on-white war,
probably.
Some soldiers from the invading army
sneak up behind Long and capture him.
They tell him he can choose to either fight or die.
Surprised, he tells them,
You guys speak pretty good English.
The invaders are also taken aback,
one said in a hushed voice,
He speaks pretty good English
Long fights alongside the invaders
but in the first battle, they retreat
and force a wounded Long to fend for himself,
saying his skin makes for a good shield and nothing else.
The Vikings surround Long.
He manages to kill one of them
and the Viking leader admires his resilience against death.
Long is captured, shackled, and nursed back to health
by the dead Viking’s wife and child.
Long is taught the Viking ways and the Nordic language.
He teaches the Viking leader how to speak English,
and Mandarin,
and Vietnamese,
and talks about Pop Tarts a lot.
He and the dead Viking’s wife fuck and fall in love
and he cares for her child
and the rest of the village.
In the next battle, he sides with the Vikings.
The dead Viking’s wife helps Long wear
her late husband’s armor.
(Long is thinking all of this is really weird:
to wear the belongings of a stranger like you own it).
He charges along with the remaining Viking army towards
the white-European invaders armed with Gatling guns.
Everyone dies,
except for Long.
He walks away unscathed
and alone.
He hurries to find the DeLorean untouched,
and wonders if this will contribute to a yellow-savior complex
He gets in, inputs 2003, and drives 88MPH
while wondering if his actions will contribute to
a yellow-savior complex.
He finds every single producer of The Last Samurai,
slaps them in the face,
angrily points at them
and tells them to,
Stop it!
Long returns back to the present,
parks his new car in the driveway
and resumes eating at the dining table
just as Molly finishes passing around
the chopsticks and plate full of xiu mai.
The TV is playing an advertisement for the academy award winning movie:
The Last Viking starring John Cho
Long exhales a tired breath of relief,
He smiles at everyone,
but does not break eye contact
as he looks on to see the results of his hard work.
Their fingers handle the chopsticks
the same way a newborn fawn’s legs handle the ground.
As if their hands have been used to fumbling this culture before.
They pinch,
press,
grip,
suffocate,
struggling to crane a morsel into their widened mouths
salivating to consume something foreign.
One gives up and uses a fork,
but the rest get creative
and bare hands begin to pick at the meal like starving raven beaks.
Long continues to stare. Silent.
No one bothers to ask him how to properly handle chopsticks.
In a cyberpunk future
where the dark billowed
smoke of clouds
are an extended metaphor for
a 20th century mistake,
and their cries streak
like rich-struck-oil
onto the metal and concrete
gritty we house ourselves in.
As the neon pink moonlight
peeks between blinds
and glows a bedroom into a waking streetlamp
under the 2,040th night in
a futuristic Tokyo that is still trying to
stomach a calm between tradition
and industry
with a culture as Paleolithic
as hands, long dead,
molding clay into mirrors
reflecting faces
that are at most: Asian
and at most: Japanese
would make one wonder:
Why does the main cyborg police officer in very Asian Tokyo look like Scarlet Johansson?
And every Japanese resident
in this trailer is directed to act like that’s normal.
Like we are being conditioned to watch
another white body be better
at being Asian than the actual Asian
people around her. She wall runs like
she invented it. Cocks a gun and pulls
the trigger like it’s her skin’s inheritance.
Headshots erase henchmen,
who are at most: Japanese
and at most: Asian,
from existence.
Her character, Mira Killian, gets to
reach across an ocean and bleach
“Motoko Kusanagi” from the
Japanese tongue
then instruct that tongue
how to pronounce her American
name correctly.
Even in the superpowered idealized
future in very Asian Tokyo, we are
only good at being the sidekick,
the scientist,
the old-wise sage,
the geisha,
the villain,
the victim,
the women—a fetishized fuck trapped in a refrigerator
to be consumed now or displayed later
and then disappeared,
the men—in various stages of dying or teaching
and then disappeared. We still need to be saved.
Still need to be a caricature. Our hands can’t
possibly handle our own stories--
that Hollywood continues to Columbus.
-----------------
A SEAT AT THE TABLE
Long Duc Dong is
half-Chinese,
half-Vietnamese,
all-Asian,
full of teenage angst and emotion,
foreign exchange student
living in an all-white picket fence house,
in an all-white suburb,
with an all-white family,
eating some bland-ass food
with an all-white name, like quiche,
trying to survive the interrogation
of all the white faces
with bright-ass smiles
desperate for his yellow foreign tongue
to confirm
that the taste
translates between oceans.
He tells them nothing.
Instead
he presses play on the stereo,
increases the volume to undeniable
and waits for Public Enemy’s Chuck D.
to scald their fragile white ears off.
He reaches into his book bag
pulls out a fresh bottle of Kikkoman and Sriracha
and bathes the quiche in it
until the aroma from his mother’s house
geysers out of the meal
and steams it into xiu mai.
He snaps chopsticks down the center
rubs them together,
takes one bite of the new and improved meal,
and excitedly hands a full plate and chopsticks to Molly
instructing her to pass it around
in a perfect
all-white accent
that silks out of his mouth
and into the perked-up ears
of the white-accented
who are looking at each other,
eager to figure out who gets
to be the first one
to compliment him on his English
today.
Long presses his palms onto the table,
lifts himself up,
grunts like he’s been carrying a railroad on his shoulders
and marvels at how quick his handprint evaporates from the table.
He walks out the front door.
Steps onto the paved
streets of white suburbia
and almost gets clipped by a speeding GMC DeLorean.
An old white man
in a white lab coat
with white strands of hair on his head
that sway Woodstock with the wind,
and a scrawny, white, teenage kid
rush out of the car to check on him.
The old man hurriedly asks,
Hey kid, are you alright? Are you okay?
But it sounds less like English
and more like, dog-chewing-on-the-morning-newspaper.
Long’s Casio rings to remind him he’s late for school.
He says, Yes
and grabs the keys from the old man,
pushes the kid out of the way,
and drives off in his new car.
the teenage kid turns to the old man and asks,
Doc, what happened?
The old man, shocked into stillness,
replies with a pale complement:
I don’t know, Marty.
He just spoke English so well.
The kid, in complete disbelief,
rubs his forehead and replies,
This is heavy.
Long parallel parks perfectly
into an open space at Theodore Roosevelt High School
and leaves the engine running.
He walks the white halls of his school,
passing the bust of an old white dead man they worship,
and steps into his classroom.
He notices Greg, Jake, Josh, Barbara and the rest of his bullies,
whose mouths have chewed and grinded
the name his mother and father gave him
down to a slur,
are all sitting in
one
long
row
with pale cheeks like a blank canvas
and Long is an artist giving into inspiration
and his hand is a paint brush.
He charges down the row
(like he is outrunning the possibility that a teacher is right behind him)
and he slaps the color into each one of them.
Long realizes he’s got a lot of work to do,
rushes to the DeLorean
fiddling with all the buttons and knobs
and drives 88MPH
to 1960,
kidnaps
Mickey Rooney playing Mr. Yunioshi,
and drops him off in 1942
just in time for breakfast
at Manzanar.
The DeLorean malfunctions
and Long is sent further back in time.
He finds himself in the middle of a war
between Vikings and white-European invaders.
Long pulls out a lawn chair from the trunk of his car
and microwaves some popcorn,
sits down and watches
the world’s first white-on-white war,
probably.
Some soldiers from the invading army
sneak up behind Long and capture him.
They tell him he can choose to either fight or die.
Surprised, he tells them,
You guys speak pretty good English.
The invaders are also taken aback,
one said in a hushed voice,
He speaks pretty good English
Long fights alongside the invaders
but in the first battle, they retreat
and force a wounded Long to fend for himself,
saying his skin makes for a good shield and nothing else.
The Vikings surround Long.
He manages to kill one of them
and the Viking leader admires his resilience against death.
Long is captured, shackled, and nursed back to health
by the dead Viking’s wife and child.
Long is taught the Viking ways and the Nordic language.
He teaches the Viking leader how to speak English,
and Mandarin,
and Vietnamese,
and talks about Pop Tarts a lot.
He and the dead Viking’s wife fuck and fall in love
and he cares for her child
and the rest of the village.
In the next battle, he sides with the Vikings.
The dead Viking’s wife helps Long wear
her late husband’s armor.
(Long is thinking all of this is really weird:
to wear the belongings of a stranger like you own it).
He charges along with the remaining Viking army towards
the white-European invaders armed with Gatling guns.
Everyone dies,
except for Long.
He walks away unscathed
and alone.
He hurries to find the DeLorean untouched,
and wonders if this will contribute to a yellow-savior complex
He gets in, inputs 2003, and drives 88MPH
while wondering if his actions will contribute to
a yellow-savior complex.
He finds every single producer of The Last Samurai,
slaps them in the face,
angrily points at them
and tells them to,
Stop it!
Long returns back to the present,
parks his new car in the driveway
and resumes eating at the dining table
just as Molly finishes passing around
the chopsticks and plate full of xiu mai.
The TV is playing an advertisement for the academy award winning movie:
The Last Viking starring John Cho
Long exhales a tired breath of relief,
He smiles at everyone,
but does not break eye contact
as he looks on to see the results of his hard work.
Their fingers handle the chopsticks
the same way a newborn fawn’s legs handle the ground.
As if their hands have been used to fumbling this culture before.
They pinch,
press,
grip,
suffocate,
struggling to crane a morsel into their widened mouths
salivating to consume something foreign.
One gives up and uses a fork,
but the rest get creative
and bare hands begin to pick at the meal like starving raven beaks.
Long continues to stare. Silent.
No one bothers to ask him how to properly handle chopsticks.
Mark Mazais a Pilipino-American writer from Orange County, California who grew up between
Tondo, Manila and Westminster, CA. He has received fellowships from Community Literature
Initiative and Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation (VONA). He helps organize The
Definitive Soapbox Open Mic (Long Beach) and Long Beach Poetry Slam.
Tondo, Manila and Westminster, CA. He has received fellowships from Community Literature
Initiative and Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation (VONA). He helps organize The
Definitive Soapbox Open Mic (Long Beach) and Long Beach Poetry Slam.