Assimilation BluesAuthor(s): Constance MerrittSource: Callaloo, Vol. 23, No. 1, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender: Literature and Culture(Winter, 2000), p. 43Published by: The Johns Hopkins University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3299512 .

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ASSIMILATION BLUES

by Constance Merritt

The moon's silver, the sun's plentiful gold, The splendor of the prince and all his world

Beguiled our eyes until we came to hate The things of home: the smell of brine, the weight

Of waterlight, the palaces' dank walls

Dripping jewels-corals, ambers, pearls,

And cockle-shells. We let our garden plots, Much cherished once, run rife with weeds; forgot

The haunting songs our mothers sang, our own Voices dissonant in our ears; each of us alone

In self-disgust: the scales, the backward tongue, The fish's tail, the way we swam among

The animals, the lowest ones, soulless As they were. The old ones grieved for us: solace

We spurned; there was nothing for it but to leave, And it seemed small sacrifice for us to give

Everything for what we'd get in turn: Love and a soul.

Well, live and learn.

Callaloo 23.1 (2000) 43

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