I’m excited more people will see my poem “Still I Stand” because it’s in the AAPI Heritage Month guide produced by the City of Los Angeles for our regional events. Read below:
Don’t get me wrong, I love trees so much. It’s easy to love trees as they are tall and easy to see. Dandelions are treated as weeds and perhaps undervalued. But I find them so delightful as I bump into these little dots of gold when my dog and I are wandering around different parks. I also value underestimated smaller things, well, because I was the shrimp among my classmates and still am a petite person. There is such a bias for tall and big, and we scrappy beings are also mighty things.
I wrote this while doing my best to pay homage to Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise.” She is one of my first inspirations. As an Asian American girl, I leaned on Black women poets and writers to inspire me, well, because there weren’t that many AAPI women writers that were taught in schools or published in my formative years. This is before the days of YouTube. Speaking of, I’m very thankful for YouTube so that I can see videos of people I admire. Here’s Maya Angelou performing this favorite poem. I love her “sassy” style.
This is my list of AAPI poets and writers who have inspired me:
My #genx foundation of AAPI books:
*Amy Tan’s, “Joy Luck Club”
*Maxine Hong Kingston’s “Woman Warrior”
*Trinh T. Min-Ha’s “Woman, Native, Other”
*Ron Takaki’s “A Different Mirror”
* Helen Zia’s “Asian American Dreams”
And as you might be curious about other AAPI writers, my friend has curated some Pacific Islander books at her bookshop.
What are your favorite books written by AAPI authors? If you are curious to know more, please come check out my May 8th event with these amazing AAPI working poets and writers. Happy reading!