sounds by tien taylor

Pronunciation/definition
Phước Huệ (fuhk hyoo): Name of a temple. Peace. Happiness
Nam Mô A Di Đà Phật (Nammo ayida fuhk): respect offered to the enlightened one, Buddha
Phật (fuhk): Buddha
 
Forty years in America
Yet you avoid learning the language.
 
As if English has blue eyes and hands
That’ll rid that durian smell
 
Off your skin with holy water.
 
                    Fuck you?       No,
                    Phước Huệ
 
The temple you force me to go to,
Hoping monks will help me speak correctly.
 
Nothing but pink stripes on my ankles and wrists.
 
            Nam Mô A Di Đà Phật
 
Bowing your head to the floor, you pray.
Can your god from Nepal understand you?
 
I join you,
 
                     The creation of words--
                     for I have sinned.
 
I don’t call him Buddha,
But by what you call him--
 
                      Fuck    I said
                      Fuck    I said
 
            Fuck    Fuck    Fuck   Fuck

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Tien Taylor is an Asian-American watercolorist and writer. She majored in Arts: Creative Writing from University of Washington, Tacoma. Her work has appeared in Two Words For, Hummingbird Press, Eastlit, Poplorish, The Murmur House, Tahoma West and others. Follow her at www.Twitter.com/TienWrites