Christine Liwag Dixon
L Does Not Stand for Ling Ling
i walk into first grade with a fistful of pencils,
my name written on each one in my mother’s tiny letters.
“what’s the ‘L’ for?” a cLassmate sneers, gLaring at my middLe initiaL,
“Little eyes?”
i am asked variations of this over the years —
“is the L for Ling Ling/Lucy Liu/Lumpia/Love you Long time/Long duk dong/Lo mein?”
untiL
i refuse to use my middLe initiaL aLtogether,
refuse to Let this right angLe sLingshot racism
at the name i inherited from my mother’s father,
a proud businessman whose name comes from the
tagaLog word “Liwanag” which means “Light” in engLish
but means “heavy” to a fiLipino american girL
whose heritage is a bitter weight upon her tongue
grown thick with american voweLs.
one day
i wiLL make them swaLLow not just the L,
but aLso the I that foLLows It,
defIantLy taLL LIke revoLutIonarIes fIghtIng off
three hundred years of coLonIzatIon;
I wILL make them savor the W,
tWIn peaks once raIsed to BathaLa
forced Into hIdIng but stILL standIng;
I WILL make them choke on the A
thAt ushered In A neW erA of coLonIALIsm,
the AbAkAdA dIspLAcIng the eLegAnt fIgures
We hAve forgotten hoW to WrIte,
Let ALone speAk
our tongues cLenched In our fIsts
LIke weApons in the hAnds of An AduLt
Who hAs LeArned to Love her WhoLe mIddLe nAme,
ALL the Letters,
from the L thAt does not stAnd for LIng LIng
to the G thAt noW GuArds her AGAInst peopLe Who Ask
“LIWAG? WhAt kInd of WeIrd foreIGn nAme Is thAt?”
the L And I And W And A and G rIse together
And fInALLy fInd the strenGth to sAy–
“Go to heLL.”
Christine Liwag Dixon is a multiracial Filipino American writer and musician. She is the author of Barkada Tayo: Essays on Being Filipino-American (Amazon Digital Services, 2016) and From These Islands I Rise. (Independently published, 2018). Her work has appeared in Apocrypha and Abstractions, Foliate Oak, Marias at Sampaguitas, and Plum Tree Tavern.
SUBMIT to What Rough Beast via our SUBMITTABLE site.
If you enjoyed today’s poem and you value What Rough Beast, consider making a donation to Indolent Books, a nonprofit poetry press.