WHO AM I ?
Dainess Maganda
I am a lost
identity
I am a struggling
soul
I am a shuttered
mind
I am a mumbling
mouth
I don’t know who I am
I was born with a
voice but lost it
I am told English
is all that matters
I am told my
identity doesn’t matter
I am persuaded my
voice is worthless
I am taught to
learn what is popular
I am told to ignore
who I am
I am told to forget
what it means to be me
I am told to go
with the flow
I am forced to
mourn the loss of my essence
But, I don’t know
who I am and so, I don’t think it matters
I am a lost soul, a
lost voice, a lost identity, a lost value of humanity.
The world tells me
Don’t worry,
You don’t need to
learn in a language you understand
Because it is not
the language of power
You don’t need to
comprehend what you learn
You don’t need to
be who you are in order to know what the world is
You don’t need to
be heard for the world to notice you
You only need to
speak as the world does – what matters is what
you should do and
not what you need to do.
Cry your heart out –
the world cannot hear because it doesn’t know your voice
Speak, the world
won’t mind because it doesn’t understand your language
Sleep, the world
won’t notice because it can’t feel your heart beat
Close your mind,
because that is what the world wants you to do and
Close your heart,
because that’s what the world NEEDS you
to do
BUT, I say
Let me speak, let
me breathe,
Let me live.
My life makes
Humanity
I matter.
In “Multilingual
Education and Sustainable Diversity Work” 2012 T. Skutnabb-Kangas
