fear

fear used to look like a sheikh
or any large bearded man in a long thawb
his mustache looking like two airplane wings

fear took the form of a huge eagle tattoo spreading
across the chest, accompanied by long hair
seemingly unwashed

fear was violent lashes,
foreign grounds, and names I could barely pronounce

but now fear is walking by English pubs with my British Mauritian Tinder date, waiting to find out
what the drunk white men tonight will shout
ni hao at me (a Vietnamese, by the way)
or namaste and go cut your dirty hair at him

fear is me and my Muslim dude not knowing
what and where we will be when our visa expires
so we’ll just roll a smoke and stare through the vapor

fear permeates tonight’s dining table
of you and your friends, all with unfair skin colors
gathering for some destressing, yet dreading
one of you might leave the country tomorrow after the major layoffs

the most terrifying stuff, after all,
are fears that go undiscussed

Brighton, 3/2023
–
written for my Race, Culture and the Media class