A Very Terrible Trauma
for Jade
To us a victor!
to your adopters
an eternal burden
denied due process
parental needs eclipsed yours
Dutch parents dissatisfied
return policy expired
store credit refused
adult exception
diplomat father
inhabited Hong Kong
open market bought your salvation
secret money back guarantee
parents reviled
you beloved
your abandoned legacy
orphaned testament
seven-year-old Korean girl
Dear White Family,
you say you love me but you voted for hate
I cannot meet you on your white side
white lies suffocated me
I believed
I could never be white enough for you
you helped create this
to call me daughter, sister
dismantle your whiteness
Dear White Family,
do you really think you’re better than me?
you said I was the most beautiful
is it inferiority oppression?
I was never white enough
Right enough
Perfect enough
Why don’t you march around Jericho
until your white privilege walls
are made of justice, equality for all?
Dear White Family,
please say you regret your vote for hate
I will never be white like you
nor do I want to be
Relinquishment Quiz
Please select the answer that best matches your adoption file. If there is a match, you will get to meet your Korean mother. You have five minutes to complete the quiz.
A. Your mother was a college student
needed to finish school
loved you so much
she sent you away
B. Your mother was a factory worker
no sex education, birth control
needed to work
money was tight
at least she didn’t abort you
C. Your mother was a drug addict, poor
no family, no social status, no power
no privilege, mental illness haunted her
I pray she got saved
now Christian
D. Your mother was unwed
mistress, victim, prostitute
abandoned you at the police box
*If you fail this Relinquishment Quiz, you may try again next summer if an agency worker is available. Please schedule your quiz appointment at least two months in advance. You will need to pay the fifty-dollar fee again. We accept cash only.
Consider
after Scott Cohen, “Popular Turf Varieties”
When choosing the best variety of children
first select one
that will best suit the needs
of your whole family
that will thrive in your local environment
The most important factor to consider
in selecting
is the ability of the children to survive
the intended use from adults
is there adequate sunlight to support?
space that favors intolerant varieties of children?
Consider your choices, conditions
to plant children
installed
for an instant family.
Drop Box
Good Morning Korean Families!
If you’re done with your babies
you can deposit them in the Baby Box!
Yes, that’s correct.
just drop them off
no questions asked
anonymity guaranteed
a minister will care for your child
along with one hundred previously deposited children
all in the name of God and Jesus Christ!
Please consider a donation
so we can build more Baby Boxes
one on every street corner in Korea!
so all families will have this option
to deposit their unwanted children
then we’ll have no unwanted children
because they’re all wanted
by good church going Koreans!
You see, it’s God’s will to separate families
so we can perform our Christian service!
Caring for orphans in their distress!
Please dig a little deeper
give a little more
so we can build Baby Boxes
from sea to shining sea!
My Body’s DMZ
Abducted, kidnapped bastard
my body split by war
breathes DMZ trauma
bleeds myth story
my body floats
between east and west
ocean salt drowned me
before I reached
Amerikkka’s white supremacy shores
my unknown body
perpetually ten months old
Korean history
lied to my Buddhist soul
My birthplace straddles
US military oppression
borders liberation
divides unification
Japanese occupation
Chinese migration
Shenyang enclave
Dalian hideouts
Waldorf Astoria concierge
glares bastard judgement
white linen five course tuxedo
silverware, water goblets
outnumber my hands
Beverly Hills Wilshire Korean privilege
won’t seat me
My body trafficked war crime
discarded my white name
Asian brothers court side
reclaimed my heritage
body pieces
find peace
Said Child
Guardian Kwan Soo Kim
I am not Said Child
I am your worst nightmare
I have spent more time with my adoption file
than you took to assign my random name
I know it ain’t all fact
so which parts are fiction?
Did my Korean family approve you
to write my Child’s Progress Report
or is it the unauthorized account
of my first ten months?
By virtue of your right as my legal guardian
you’ve proven you have no character
you have no integrity
you thought white people
could raise me better than Koreans
you must hate yourself more than I ever will
You will be irrevocably terminated
you and the rest of your adoption cronies
selling Korean babies
to white christian adopters
Yesterday I broke out with diarrhea
began to snivel with a cold
I hope my feces and mucus
left eternal skid marks, stains
on your reputation and conscience
My left thigh bean-size mole
you call a defect
disappeared
Did you know white American doctors
would remove it?
tamper with crime scene evidence?
you are the defect
not me!
Last night I began to vomit
accompanie
d with slight fever
you too would be ill
if torn from your family
subjected to trauma against your will
your recommendation: milk or rice cereal
what about my Korean mother’s breast milk?
why did you deprive me?
You say I’m too young to mingle with children
how the fuck would you know?
did you ever bother to ask me?
you are too old for a relationship with the world
You signed me away
at the American Embassy in Seoul
you must have been in bed
with the Vice Consul
how is John P. Leonard doing?
remember
the US embassy
is Japan’s continued colonization.
You certified a full, true, and correct copy
of my Original Family Register
but its full of No Records
false as Satan
how do you sleep at night Guardian Kim?
For My Mother
That title is not correct
this is a poem for my mothers
My first mother
Korean
gave birth to me
in the Land of the Morning Calm
My second mother
Korean
cared for me
from the orphanage to the plane
My third mother
White
abducted, bought, adopted me
raised me in the Promised Land
Three mothers
One child
One daughter
To my Korean mother
I don’t know who you are
I don’t know your name
I don’t know your face, your history,
family, interests, home,
how you conceived me
yes, I know how babies are made but
I don’t know if you were someone’s wife,
someone’s mistress,
someone’s victim
when I was conceived
I don’t know if I was your only child
sent away from our divided country
I don’t know if you understand
how your choices impacted my life
I don’t know if you’re even alive anymore
I don’t know if you think about me
but I know I think about you
I know you look like me
or should I say
I look like you
but which parts of this body you gave me
belong to you?
To my foster mother
Ahn-Soon Lim
I waited over three decades
seven thousand miles to know your name
maybe you’re now in your seventies if you’re still alive
Does not recognize her foster mother.
Recognizing the foster mother.
Will look for her own foster mother.
Says “mom” now and then.
This is what my adoption file says,
but what do you say?
we know the papers lie
but we don’t know when
To my white mother
Mother
I’m not sure why I have to use this term when addressing you
so I have abandoned it
a purchase agreement and a
promise to raise a child in the Christian faith
do not require me to address a woman twice my age
who looks nothing like me by this title
therefore, I don’t
I’ve been told I need to be thankful to you
for giving me a better life
rescuing me from the war-ravaged country of Korea
here is what I have to be thankful for
when you told me
you paid a lot of money for me
when you told me
if you hadn’t adopted me
I’d be living a life of prostitution
on the streets of Korea
I’d be homeless or dead.
Did it ever occur to you
I can do all of those things in America?
I can go back to Korea and fulfill this destiny
or all of the above?
I’m told I should be thankful
for everything you’ve taught me
you taught me that control,
manipulation, brainwashing, and
spiritual abuse are normal in childrearing
that I am responsible for how you feel and look
that when we die we go to heaven
but the only way to get there
is to do the right thing
but no matter what I did
it would never
be good
enough
you taught me
that I was responsible for how God felt
that God was a white man
that it is best to be white
or at least an honorary white
but it’s good to have at least one black friend
as long as he is married to a white woman
you taught me interracial marriages aren’t always okay
that I should be ashamed of my body
that I am not beautiful
that college was my only option after high school
actually, you taught me a Christian college
was my only option
because I would marry someone I would meet there
you taught me that as a woman
my success would be measured by the man I would
marry and children I would birth
that it wouldn’t be right to
marry someone outside of your faith
that the only political choice
was to be a pro-life Republican
you taught me that being narrow-minded,
self-righteous and judgmental are normal
you taught me that it is okay for you
to be a hypocrite
but not for me
so for all these things I cannot
and will not
be thankful
To my Korean mother
you had no choice, no power
To my foster mother
a surrogate
To my white mother
you had choice, power, privilege
and you chose to abuse it.
One daughter.
who traveled this journey
alone.
Jealousy
We cannot let those people who do not love us
determine who we are.
—Nikki Giovanni
In the backyard
under giant tree shade
leaves fall
welcome winter
leaves I raked for years
Today is not for raking
but raking me over coals
my identity interrogated
my journey on trial
forced assimilation
my white parents sit in patio furniture they can’t afford
demand reports of my first return to Korea
Then
my white mother
slams me to my past
Jealous I was so cute, pretty
Jealous of my skinny frame
Jealousy drips off her words
Venom throws daggers I dodge
shock me back to my childhood
past crumbles
materna
l love conditional, rationed
my existence threatened her
child controlled parent
my power unaware
just wanted to make A Honor Roll
come home
sleep under safe roof
jealous of my talents you encouraged
ten year piano lessons
state competitions
inferior red second-place ribbons
coveted blue first-place ribbons
You made me into something
you could despise
resent.
Jealousy let me believe
I was the ugliest child
ever born
now you tell me
with seething envy
I was the most beautiful
in our family
but I never felt that way
I didn’t belong
Raked leaves bear witness to frozen emotions
eternally jealous of your imported child
disgraceful
You
should be ashamed
still jealous of me
I
will never
be jealous
of you.
Mother’s Day Mourning
Grieving
Healing
Day filled with sorrows
more than salt can hold
abandoned children grieve
now grown ass adults
grief floods hearts
like hurricanes
Lives lost,
Erased,
Invisible,
Silenced,
Deported,
Terminated.
Now parents, grandparents
we are treated like children
nation’s doors slam adopted faces
own your shame
Street corners block family reunions
corrupt agencies
aunts, grandmothers
skin holds lies
secrets whisper decades’ betrayal
Hallmark, FTD, boutique shops proclaim
Where Mother’s Day Wishes Come True
but it’s
a fucking
lie
Deception extinguishes
birthday candle wishes
Mother’s Day our social media detox
try
to survive
this fucking day
Reunions kept family secrets
holiday gathering invites lost
told to end rendezvous
you deny you ever knew us
rejection once wasn’t enough
we wish
we never looked for you
you wish
the same
Honor Thy Father