Hyphen - American

You ask what I am
Where I come from
And this is all I can say
I stayed up all night formulating this thesis
So please listen well
So you won’t ask again

I am Hyphen-American
I’ve memorized the slash
Between African and American
I know you’ve tried hard
Changed my name from nigger to Negro to African-American to Black
Hope the work didn’t give you a heart attack see
You’re right we’re moving up the ladder
Got away from the back of the bus
Even stay in the White House every now and then

Send Jesse Jackson to speak for us on behalf of red, white and blue
But you see I told you already
I’ve memorized my name and it doesn’t matter if you’ve erased the n word from your vocabulary
Told your kids its not nice to say that
I’ve memorized my name
See right now that slash be the border, the bridge, the checkpoint,
Let me know that even though I live here in this country, I love here
My parents cleaned toilets in college in this country

I may have lost friends in 911 too
But that slash be the line I know not to cross
That slash be my mothers accent
Strong and thick like Arabic coffee
That slash be my brothers paralyzed body deported back to
Nigeria cause he was a felon who wasn’t a citizen it’s really okay
I understand where I belong

You can change the names
Rearrange the terms of debate but I know I’m not a nigger anymore
But an other, an evil doer,
The Arab you stop at the airport
The Palestinian boy bloodied by cowardly fists on his way to school the day after Sept 11
I am nothing safe
I am nothing comfortable like your new lazy boy sofa
I am the one who makes you lock your door at night
Keep your kids out of sight and I’ve memorized my name
I told you already, I know this game
The slash, the distance between you and me
Let me know that you’re American and I’m African-American or African in America
Or just plain wrong

That slash, the look on my face
The day the government declared
Nigeria the #3 possible terrorist country in the world
And what do I do now
What flag do I claim
What if it’s not about governments or terrorists
What if its about my cousins begging for bread and the broken promise of a full belly back home
What if it’s about faces of family you’ve etched in your mind
Hold close to your chest
What if it’s about Black women looking for more than minimum wage and welfare to work that doesn’t ever seem to work
What if it’s about my very own mother and father from the land you call other, foreign, terrorist, and while I’m on the subject
I thought I’d set the record straight.

I am everything American
I am the hope of my whole Nigerian village
My mother’s dream to find me more than one meal a day
I am the Border Patrol agent
Whose last name is Gutierrez or Luna or Gonzalez
Pointing a gun at the same woman who took his mother across the border years ago
I am hands picking cotton so most Americans can enjoy cotton sheets
I am the belly dancing class you call exotic
The hummus and pita bread you call Californian cuisine
I am your safari trip to Africa where you spend the night in the fanciest hotels, take photos of Black women riding elephants
And come back to say you’ve traveled all over Africa

So I don’t know why you call me foreign or other
Cause you’ve eaten my food, called it your genius creation
You’ve dug into my land and between my thighs
Called anything you’ve laid your hand on yours
By now the statue of liberty should be a pregnant third-world woman with a baby slung on her
Balancing a bucket of water on her head
That should be what you see when you reach these shores
Because I am everything American
Nothing foreign, the border you’ve already crossed.
Come to ask you where are your papers

-Uchechi Kalu Copyright 2003 All Rights Reserved.