I am in a place I can’t call home.
Seeing rundown streets, smelling the shameless air.
Alone for a reason I
don’t know.
Vexatious voices, screeching sirens,
“s? ies de drum” ringing.
Faces of babies appearing.
Children that are “just like me” stay here.
Cemented walls chipped, cracked, and rusted from
the brisk cold.
Just waiting, waiting, waiting...

The impact of the air never felt free.
10 hours, 21 minutes, until I could breathe.
Crying, kicking, screaming,
to yawning, snoring, sleeping.
Eyes pounding my
moves.
Hearing “What a cute little girl” while seeing faces
tickle, and touch me because I’m “cute.”
Forgetting what I’m doing, but not why I'm here.
Citizenship is the ticket to my future.

I am in a place I can call home.
Traditional lasagna Sunday dinners.
Annual Packer games
     with the guy that won’t stop eating,
     and the girl that won’t stop yelling.
Successfully, swishing shots
on Saturdays.
Intense car jam sessions to Hannah Montana with
friends that make me wild and crazy.
To repeatedly hearing
“Quite down” when I’m singing at the
top of my lungs, and
stomping my feet on the cold hardwood floor.
Dreaming, wishing, sweating, working,
to be rewarded with a scholarship.
Making it possible
because I know can, and because of the people around me.
Making me who I am today...