Home Economics
Consider the market.
Consider the gross domestic product of Korea. Call it Kimchi.
Ferment culture in a brine of Ks buried underground.
In the spring, it comes out KBBQ, KPop, KDramas.
Consider that Japan renamed Corea during its occupation
so Japan would be first alphabetically.
Consider the ways we want to be read by our colonizers,
the impossibility of being written otherwise.
Consider that Korea's early exports were bodies
cast across water: women and children first.
Brides and babies.
Consider the ways they make us palatable. Call us culture.
Ferment children in a brine of Ks buried underground.
They come out "kids." Consider the connotations.
Consider that my parents renamed me during my adoption
so that my name would be more conveniently exotic.
Consider that a White girl taught me
how to write my name in Hangeul,
a ghost of my colonizers, a Koreaboo.
Consider my mother at work, receiving a phone call.
She says she was very calm, she did not cry.
Consider that at work, she called my name
out for the first time, finally having language in my place.
Consider that after work, she went to the market
to buy groceries, like any other day.
Consider the market.
Copyright Credit: Chaelee Dalton, "Home Economics" from Mother Tongue. Copyright © 2021 by Chaelee Dalton. Reprinted by permission of Gold Line Press.
Source: Mother Tongue (Gold Line Press, 2021)