I couldn't see money when I was a child,
only palm trees, and chasing, and temples,
so maybe that was why
I forget the rice farms,
the tin houses,
and lack of plumbing.
There were just chickens to chase,
and clothes to stain with crimson mud.
The dirt was the bane of my mother,
and for twenty years she ran,
hating its stain,
though I called it 'home.'
All of my memories are full of tin bowls,
carved in beautiful, sharp diamond patterns,
the type you buy at a thalat
for just a few baht
to get a drink of water
or of coconut.
Even cheap rings worth nothing
were a kind of magic to me
and I bought them
five baht,
two baht,
one baht,
cheaply carved.
I showed them to my grandmother
and she would 'oooh' and 'aaah'
and tell me she loved them
in the days before I lost my tongue
to a father's fear
a new country,
a home, but no homeland.
I did not see people stare
at the white skin I wore
when people would touch me just to know if I felt the same
as any other child would
anywhere in the village
who were baked longer than I.
My cousins were my world
and I bathed outdoors with no shame
playing with a palm frond fishing pole
my grandfather carved
with a knife,
some imagination,
and country learning.
I loved the food off the carts,
the icecream man and his radio blaring,
as me and my cousins raced outside
shouting for him,
waving money,
hoping he'd stop for us
and scoop coconute ice cream
into a hotdog bun with rice.
But as I grew older my eyes grew wider,
and the temples and Bangkok made me feel less small,
and the farms less small still
until their confines chafed,
their poverty itched,
and their worries bit
like fleas off my grandpa's dog.
I cannot tell if I grew wise or grew stupid,
but I saw what my mother saw,
and tried to understand why she ran,
yet still I consider
that red dirt
to be something of home.