My old classmate tells me our acquaintance is five months pregnant She’s starting to show and she visited the nursery teachers I wonder where all the pregnant girls at my school go My leader for the City District program asks us to dress up He takes us down to a session of City Council and cameras are everywhere I am pulled into a publicity stunt without consent
By: Maanasi Shyno
Radicalization
My parents wait with me in ICE for a whole day They say we can’t just leave to India for the funeral without permission I don’t understand why the US won’t naturalize me already
Hello world, it’s me, Maanasi. I’m calling to tell you I’m a radical. Yeah, really. I decided you are far too cruel for me to be anything else. 17
My global politics teacher shows us 13th the year it comes out He teaches us what evil looks like outside of fiction I stop pledging allegiance to the flag My patients in Long Beach tell me about their pain They teach me more about oppression than I learn about medicine I think I’m interested in healthcare, but that’s not what draws me there at all My manager tells me to keep going when my shoelaces snap He says it may be the last day of the campaign, but every vote counts I still believe politics has to be about picking between two evils My friends and I head downtown on my birthday They marvel at the number of unhoused camped around City Hall I am not able to stop staring My lab partner groans when we’re stopped by canvassers at the corner He doesn’t know that I also ask for signatures in my freetime I can’t engage in politics any other way My old boss sends me an article about the candidate we got elected He is caught up in some gambling mess I laugh in disbelief because of course he is My professor teaches us about foreign aid in Afghanistan He asks if anyone knows anything about interventionism I realize how frustrated I am with American terror My university with a six billion dollar endowment says that it won’t lower tuition It claims it can’t pay employees without collecting the same amount I can’t even act surprised anymore My sister listens to a podcast about Tara Reade She weeps and plays it again I see her scowl at Biden on the television screen
