Foreigner | বিদেশিনী

By Amy Noor - @amtunechi

The day I flew across the world

From one foreign land to another

Little did I know

From that day onward

I will forever be a foreigner

Some days I wish

I could travel back in time

To console the restless heart

That will travel for more than a decade

In search of a home

And fall short upon arrival

No matter the destination

These words

Are for the Sun who burns so bright

She never sees the flowers that bloom

From her warmth

The importance of staying

In touch with one’s roots

Comes often with age

Your surroundings will snip and crop

Parts of your culture without your permission

In these parts, you are nothing but

Costumes and performance art

Sometimes this land only knows to appropriate

While fostering nothing else

Therefore,

Immerse

Absorb

Engross

In the place you came from

To make up for years

Lost on pretending

You belonged somewhere else

And when they call you too much

Too “woke”, too sensitive

Feel free to remind them

Your entire upbringing

Has been an extremity

The last breath of energy

Used to greet loved ones

The last bite of food

Shared or fought over

The last dime spent on basic necessities

You are a first-generation immigrant

No wonder you feel in extremes

And if you are still made to feel small

Let your presence be the largest

When you re silenced

Let your voice be the loudest

When you are left behind

Let your strides be the longest

When you are so inevitably marginalized

Demand they notice you

And when you do, be proudest

And when you return to the motherland

Awestruck, you will wonder

How you have walked this earth

Without having walked the grounds

Where your feet were meant to be planted

The green greener

The flowers more pigmented

The wind more fragrant

The soil more fertile

The monsoon more cleansing

The women with bright marigolds in their hair

The warmth that surpasses language

And the aura

More like home

But your course hasn’t been steady

All you want is to contort yourself

In ways that’ll allow you to fit in

But your soul is too untamed

For a Eurocentric mold

And don’t you ever mistake

“What are you?” for comfort

For it will always be a microaggression

And you – always a foreigner

In another foreigner’s perception

But one day you’ll fall in love with

Having emerged from a world of enigma

Where only you belong

ওগো বিদেশিনী

Lady foreigner

You’re a mystical concept

An inspiration behind Tagore’s famous song

If you give it a listen

You, too, will be caught in a daydream

And the word foreigner will radiate your aura

And take a whole new meaning

You’ll be so enamored with the beauty

In your own origin

You’ll forever have the word foreigner

Etched on your soul

And sometimes

You might even have it inked on your skin