Observations Through Yellow Glasses: A Memoir Through Poems

By Yong Takahashi

Yong Takahashi moved to The United States with her parents when she was three years old. She grew up in a traditional household where her Korean and American worlds pulled her in opposite directions. Shortlisted for The Sexton Prize for Poetry, OBSERVATIONS THROUG

• Language: English
• Publisher: Yong Takahashi
• Release date: Jun 17, 2024
• ISBN: 9798330239313

Yong Takahashi

Yong Takahashi is an author of fiction and poetry. She was a finalist in The Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing, Southern Fried Karma Novel Contest, Gemini Magazine Short Story Contest, The Writers' Mastermind Short Story Contest, and The Sexton Prize for Poetry. She is currently querying a YA dystopian novel and writing a fantasy trilogy. To learn more about Yong, visit: https://linktr.ee/yongversation

Book preview

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OBSERVATIONS THROUGH YELLOW GLASSES

A Memoir Through Poems

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Copyright © 2022 Yong Takahashi

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced

in any form without the expressed consent of the author. Names, characters, businesses, places, incidents, and events are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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Write hard and clear about what hurts.

--Ernest Hemingway

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

INNOCENCE LOST

Message Across Space and Time

Fortunes

The Hood

School Days

Special Education

Polish

Cafeteria Tree

Why I Don’t Have Children

Panning For Gold

Halloween

Perspective

Little Ninja

Proverbs

Guilt

Haunted Lullabies

Bald

Winners and Losers

Coat of Arms

SEARCHING FOR LOVE

Games

Ultimatum

The Circus

The Truth

Broken

Shaken From the Family Tree

Chase

Longing

Confessions

It’s Not You, It’s Me

Void

Practice Life

What We Lost

Fiction

Mirage

Crown

Gone

Blue Grave

Confidant

Literacy Lesson

Unexpected Gift

HEALING

Stages of Healing

Promises

Death by a Thousand Cuts

Stages

Light or Dark

Doubt

Choices

Poison

Peace

I’m Weathered Enough

Death By Inches

Sunday

Light Within

Traces

Tombstones

Lessons Learned

Stay Away

Family Heirloom

Disappointment

Poison

My Vagina is NOT for Sale

Slow Burn

The Collector

Warmth

Reasons

Pain

Change of Address

Promised Land

Finding Gray

Memory

Soft Imprints

Acknowledgements

About the Author

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INNOCENCE LOST

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Message Across Space and Time

Message Across Space and Time

……………………………………

mud-stained, bruise-faced, ego-strangled

on the way to school, while there, and 

chased home to more of the same

while almost everyone escapes blackness

in one place or the other, you suffer

everywhere, all the time

your parents wish you didn’t exist

laughing at your fears

silencing your dreams

classmates throw rock-encased snowballs

you wonder how a child can

survive in an unforgiving world

voices say you don't belong

crushing you before you're fully formed

but you find a way to stay strong

please believe it gets better little one

keep your head down, arms tucked in

so you don't get