No Place Like Home

You say life is fascinating when your maps keep changing.
You say life folds into itself like the waves on the same shore, yet you swim anyway.
Life as an Asian immigrant is like watching a rerun of Finding Nemo.
Except this time, Nemo never makes it back home.
Belonging becomes something so rare that the leaves of a golden wattle fall.
Immigrant life turns friendship into wet ink––
promises blur before they dry.

You say life is better once the document is signed,
Finding a place that grounds your feet is like having roots.
The story of life expanded through the addition of:
another stamp of others’ stories to your passport,
another home to your photo scrapbook that had been filled long ago,
another entry to the contact books of friends that you promised to keep.

Belonging is as hard as teaming up with Dory to find your Nemo.
Flipping through the photo scrapbook, each photo hums with what you left behind.
The scent of nostalgia, where your foundation is simple to find.
Planting your roots in the lands of the beaver is where I learned a new way to grow.
The soil of my origin clings to the branches of new relations I’ve formed.
Life is like watching a crooked path overgrown with weeds—
the one you once begged to walk on.