The Man Who Teaches
By Veronica R., San Antonio, TX
the man who teaches
the short class at Math Camp
he talks
like a FOB - someone fresh off the boat.
ruddy, his face, a baggy sweater, he wears
not a coat. polyester shorts, not denim
his body taut
carries
it across the room like a translucent
mauve flag
(I know not to mess with
China’s flag, but he is not what
I saw in Disneyworld)
he
was on China’s IMO team! then why is he here?
our susurration, why not at Harvard?
he
wears glasses with gold rims
like my grandma’s
earrings.
in study group (after playing
bull’s eye with chalk) we imitate his sounds.
he muddles words how queerly
his mouth swells when
it makes the letter “l” so it sounds like “r”
he talks like my mother and father
and like me more than
the cool Asians, though I cloak myself
in a blunt red flag with
beautiful speckles.
we have it easy,
we do not compete with
Chinese children for a spot in his class. we are children Chinese
and otherwise
our knowledge grew out
of a hemic ground and blasted forth
like a typhoon, breaking the life
we had before America
into easy-to-digest bits
of satire.
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