Tonight, Hanoi seems deadly silent. Perhaps everyone is mourning too.

Our leave was abrupt and happened before we could have an opinion on staying.

i feel my mother's figure growing above me

with every one of my words that she doesn't listen

My papa’s papa used to run after the wooden cart of prasadam

you yourself love to pretend you remember your own birthplace

I always knew my mother was a writer.

She hails it as her best skill.

Slick gray flesh. Slippery yellow flesh. Powdery white flesh. Three generations, one shrimp.

My mom slaps down some more dough in front of me. To eat, you must create.

"Green, they'd be green, just how my own grandpa used to have 'em," he sighs.

Dust swirls into the air. The crowd gathers nearby—safely out of the way of stamping hooves . . .

From the 200 billion trillion stars in the galaxy, 

my father gripped one

My mother fries chicken for dinner

says she hasn’t seen real chicken in America

The Zhou famiy typically ate dinner at a rectangular table for four.

"Who are they?" Roshni asked her aunt as she poured the chai into different cups

The Zhou family typically ate dinner at a rectangular table for four.

“Who are they?” Roshni asked her aunt as she poured the chai into different cups

As we approach the river, the sight between its two bridges is my worst nightmare.

With plates of food in hand, you are forced to greet vaguely familiar faces.

My dad and I have come to the mutual realisation that he can't force me to help him out in the garden. 

Their shells pricked my fingers, the spikes digging tauntingly into my skin. 

I don't even know if our sweet little lilac, right in the corner of the garden, still blooms in summer. 

A falling star taught her how to wish, but a falling star apple trunk taught her something else. 

The story my grandfather told continues to shape me today. 

I long for the day when lockdown ends and I can safely visit Evie again. 

I knew Chinatown best on Saturdays, 

the November kind

for two cents, the man 

answering will reach into the ocean

We act like we're pleasantly thrust together instead of a family bound by grief and love. 

As a Haenyeo, a Korean sea-woman, her day was just beginning, even before the sun rose in the bitter oceanic cold to ready herself to dive for her day's catch.

The embassy called and approved our request to leave the country. So we packed our clothes and a couple of other essentials, leaving the rest behind.

When my mother and father had left for the west, they brought few things with them. 

As a child, my relationship with my dad was very straightforward. I'd ask him for something and he'd say "yes" or "no." 

In the jungles of Aklan stands a statue of a man I've never met.

Stands a monument to a face I've never seen.

My words can be a sense of comfort, a feeling of being understood, a thought, an awakening. 

Rice piled on my plate like a cold white ant bed. Mom adjusted her glasses again. 

When I arrive home, there are men outside our cottage. But these are not my dada's friends. 

Change is unexpected. 

Like the day I was told we were moving to America. 

My mother came into the kitchen with a blank face. "We're leaving," she said. "We're going to move in with Ahmad in New York." 

People evaporate.

But not as quickly as water.

you have learned there is both good and bad about where you live.

you have learned the stubbornest people on the planet are Southern. 

"But Dad, a dog is the animal for me - 

I'll take him for walks and I'll make him his tea."

We act like we're pleasantly thrust together instead of a family bound by grief and love. 

Air sticks to my skin, 

like honey. mosquitos circle my ankles and wrists

These are the scents I will take with me when I leave this house.

When Uchechi’s voice crackles with laughter and her almond brown eyes crease . . .

There’s a moment in kindergarten when I realize that the other grandparents don’t smile.

I grew up eating an excessive amount of eggs. Actually, that’s a little misleading.

There's a sort of spell that falls over the dinner table as we wait for the athan to sound.

She spoke with her hands, weaving stories out of air and breathing life into them . . .

"Vente, mi amor, help me with dinner." I bound over to the kitchen, shooting a full-brace grin up at my abuela. She chuckled, patting me on the back, and led me to the counter.

"Here is the recipe", she said, waving to an ancient book . . .

You always liked to watch the trains as they passed by, one after another, right on schedule. You liked the whooshing sound of the breaks as the train slowed into the station, and the whirring of the engine as it started up again.