“The Me I Hold Inside My Heart,” by Eka Bhuyan
May 9, 2024
She is a goddess
She is cool ranch Doritos and barbecue lays
There is spice on her breath and a song on her lips
She is bold Sharpie
She’s got a heart of cheese and masala blood
She is sugar and spice
(but mostly spice)
She’s got a cockroach soul:
(the power to survive)
Her hard edges tempered with cake and cookies
(sweet things)
She is Crow Love
(loud and shiny)
but smooth and persistent
like a salmon, wiggling through the water
She is the Bullfrog Queen
croaking her heart out to the whole world
She nests in my ribcage,
collecting strange things to fill her chaotic heart
lost hair ties and pencils and joy
She is everything
She is the universe and my bedroom
She is water,
Swimming, and staying afloat,
in a world that’s hell-bent on drowning her.
This poem was written by Eka Bhuyan, as a 7th grader at Renaissance School of Art & Reasoning with WITS writer-in-residence Matt Gano. Performed at the Seattle Arts & Lectures J-Kenji López-Alt presents series with Pailin Chongchitnant on Thursday, May 9, 2024, at Town Hall Seattle.