For the majority of my life, I was told that I was a biracial child born to a Black father and a Puerto Rican mother. This guided me through my years to tell people how interesting it was to think that there are two sides to me, as if I was some coin. Honestly, I have taken a lot of pride in my Hispanic heritage although being somewhat separated from the culture (my mom died long ago, therefore neither my brother nor I learned much about Puerto Rican culture growing up). But there was something very interesting about my mother and her side of the family that I did not know until a month or so before coming to college. My aunt Mickie, my mom’s sister, told my brother and I that their father, whom the family lovingly called Weatho, was a German. 

At first this was a bit of a surprise because as far as I could remember, nobody ever made mention of any Germans in the family. Weatho was married to my grandma Maria, who was lovingly called Weatha, and she is still alive to this day whereas he passed away years ago. I don’t have any real memories of him, but Weatha looks like a Taino Puerto Rican woman and I just assumed Weatho looked the same. But no, when Mickie showed me his picture it became very clear that this man was German, red button nose and all. My immediate thoughts concerning this was that my mom didn’t look like a German woman, plus I had believed her to be a Puerto Rican my whole life, the fact that nobody told me years ago is pretty crazy.

It makes sense that he could have been from Europe; there was a time during the 19th century when many Germans immigrated to the island of Puerto Rico to escape British tariffs on imports and exports. German businesses on the island took  off well and the families that came from Germany decided to stay. This might explain where he comes from in some detail but it still is a big difference from the traditional Puerto Rican. A little backstory here, the Taino were the indigenous people of Puerto Rico and other places in the Caribbean before Christopher Colombus decided to commit mass genocide and displace everybody. But, the Tainos were darker skinned and had their own language that still persists in little ways within the Spanish spoken by Boricuas. Even the term Boricua, which Ricans call themselves, is a term that pays homage to the Tainos because it is derived from the name that they called the island before it was given its current name; once upon a time it was the island of Boriken.

So, Weatha being a Boricua and my grandfather David, Weatho, being a German means that my mom was mixed. I honestly feel a little betrayed in a hilariously amazing way. My roots run so deep in many parts of the world and I realize that as I am, a self proclaimed cultured individual, it is beautiful and fitting that the family lineage falls from so many different countries. A dream of mine is to travel to all of my “Homelands,” as I mentioned in a previous post, so Germany is definitely added to the list, right below Africa. Everybody comes from Africa so that’s a given.

In this blog I’ll do a little backstory just for anyone who’s interested. My life has been very odd and erratic but this sort of subject is pretty tame yet still wildly beautiful.

During the ninth grade, I had met this girl named Ambar while on a school trip to Temple University. She was in a different class and I had only seen her here and there in the hallways with her friends, but I always wanted to spark a conversation with her. On this particular day, while leaving from the trip, we were standing near one another in line when I said something funny to my brother and she overheard it and laughed. “Oh wow, really, Nakoa?” My first thought was, ‘She knows my name.. huh, that’s cool.’ 

After that day, we had developed this little friendship that basically survived on our occasional conversations during medical academy. At first it was minor, we spoke about our families and made little jokes here and there about the teacher. Our daily talks in a 45 minute long class were slowly turning out to be my favorite parts of the day. On one Saturday in particular, I took a gamble and decided to send her a text message asking how she was doing. Mind you, we had never texted prior to this day and I was nervous to even try because we weren’t necessarily “friends.” I told myself we’d talk for a few minutes and then say bye. She responded, saying “I’m good, how about you?” It ended up being a conversation that lasted until the very next morning.

Sadly, she transferred to a new school after the 9th grade and I was left to fend for myself. It was the kind of low point that every kid goes through when a friend leaves. My first few weeks in the 10th grade passed by silently until one day this girl named Aicha approached me during lunch. I was sitting alone, used to the silence by now, reading a book and she decided to sit with me to chat. At first it felt very invasive; she wanted to talk about food and her cultural heritage along with mine. She boasted about the Malaysian culture and how her African roots influenced that, and she asked me all about being mixed and eating different foods.  Over time I actually began to smile and enjoy the conversation.

To this day, Aicha is one of my best friends and we’ve had a long history of food conversations and hanging out with mutual friends. Our favorite thing to talk about is still food not surprisingly at all. Following that initial talk we had, I started sitting with her and her friend Vicky during everyday classes. They were an interesting pair to be pals with because even though they had just met in the school year, they already had this playful banter between them that was reminiscent of a sisterhood. I slowly grew fond of them and had this little feeling that everything would be okay; me losing my previous friends was bad but things didn’t have to stay sad forever.

Me and Vicky had this kind of banter that was totally separate from what I was used to. She had become my best friend very quickly due to the simple facts that A) we both shared a love of anime, B) the kinds of jokes that we laughed at were very dumb and unappealing to others, and C) she was so lovely to me.  I loved the way that she smelled, it was an intoxicating mix of perfume and lotion that made me melt, and I enjoyed the times that we would accidentally touch hands during class (we’d gotten used to sitting next to one another in each subject). Our classmates saw our friendship as more than what it was long before we ever did. We had a spark and it was undeniable.

Now, I am in a happily committed relationship with Vicky and there is no other person alive who I hold as dear to my heart in that sense. She was always there for me more than any of my previous friends ever were, which isn’t a knock to them but just the truth. I don’t know why I didn’t see it at the time; it took over a year, but she was always the one I wanted. Around prom time in 11th grade we finally started realizing the true potential of our connection. Aicha was still a good friend but we mostly spent time alone exploring Philadelphia after school and going to different restaurants that looked appetizing. Whether she was the one spending the money or I was, it didn’t matter as long as we had the experience together.

All in all, I think that I had a little hole filled in my heart when I met my new friends. And with Vicky, she was able to make that heart beat ten times stronger when it was fully healed.

Around the time I started the 6th grade, I began noticing how a few of my friends were becoming more introverted. I was going through the same thing, headaches everyday that led to my lack of focus in classes and outbursts of frustration towards people. It was hard to begin on this path of isolating oneself to avoid negative encounters with others.

Then, I had gotten used to sitting alone during classes and lunch, scribbling in books. I had a pretty good knack for finding words that, when paired, seemed to relay a thought, a trinket of my mental state without the breath it took to take them flying. I sought the afterthought of challenge when I no longer crawled through hardship, and instead pulled a flag and left it grounded. I’m not going to show off like that! Y’all not ready for all that!… anyway, I had these journals that were blank with lines that caught the eye and seduced scribes… I need to stop. What I’m trying to say is that I was becoming a pretty good poet who used all of his free time to write instead of hanging around people. I definitely would fit in at PYPM.

Instead of empty spaces, I fill these words on dark blotches/ A place in time that my people have forgotten/ Pieces of canvas that no artist has begot then/ I space them nicely with a shine, clear polish/ When they sound good enough to see the light of day/ Flip the script and start writing in a better way/ Some ears will be deaf to everything you say/ But most eyes can’t avoid where the sun casts rays/

I like to not only speak on things that people can relate to, but also speak on things that I feel some could never really grasp. Whether in reality they can or not, I’ve made it a practice to be as ambiguous as possible while still leaving a trail of thought to follow. Many poets do this, but I feel that it is unique to me because no one taught me how to do this, I came up with it all on my own. And, in a way, that is what connects us all as poets, we can come to the same conclusions whether we share notes with one another or not, like some kind of widespread verbal convergent evolution. Threw some biology in there… college.

Afford to spare a bit of ink and let another write/ The difference is just as clear as pitch black and white/ The pitch is changing like a singer raising up her height/ Or rather sloping like a graph in algebra, right?/ Not really good in math but I can see the end/ Hiding behind a matrix wall and dividends/ I’m not the only writer compensated with a grip of bands/ But I’m the type to shove it right back at the man/

Obviously not something incredibly deep but I still love the way that you can interpret a simile or metaphors right in between lines and capture not only an idea, but also an actual statement of fact. The difference is clear, meaning when you let someone else write something for you, you get to see their interpretation of words and meanings. The difference is clear like a song, a crescendo in a sense. Also, I have truly never been compensated for my work nor have I accepted an offer for it; I’ve always shoved the grip of bands (money) back to whomever offered. The joy of writing something you found to be awesome is all you need, along with imagination.

Now, read these words, but slowly try to analyze the message:

I miss the days your attention was in arms reach/ When I could see you from a distance you would care to speak/ Though you left I thought that we would still be close as we/ Are and now I think we’ve separated quietly/ Now all my focus went to tracing back the days of old/ Where I can see you smile and feel your gentle laughter grow/ I used to take the mental image home and hold it close/ But now they’re tearing from me, breaking for the door to go/ 

Do I need to say more or can you see the way I’m feeling/ You walked away and broke the walls down, falling ceiling/ Just to see you now would be to me the most appealing/ How can you take a heart then take a leave, always stealing/ Better call the law; I need to be before a jury/ I’ll tell ’em love is gone and this is means for rush and worry/ I’ll bring a search party out and play them music during/ They trample over our old stomping ground where we would journey/ Through the bushes that our parents told us not to go/ We snickered moving on the path that only we would know/ I held your hand and told you I could get us back to home/ Now I don’t know where to turn, you’ve let your grasp unfold

A big portion of my life was spent in silent thought. I became a shell, feeling only what I cared to feel and thinking about my life as this sort of projection on a screen; I wasn’t me, but I was watching me. So all the things I used to write about were very deep and touched on things that I would think of, but I would write them out with no problem because, in my mind, it was the same as writing about somebody else. Therefore it wasn’t difficult to lay out these raw emotions.

I say to try to analyze the meaning because that is how you get better at feeling the emotion within it.

It was a pretty sad time back then. Loving your poems felt like everything, but I had nobody to really share them with. Plus, in the 6th grade, I was a pretty sharp kid who always acted like he didn’t belong and other people didn’t vibe well with me because of it. It made me cringe to even think about having a conversation. All I wanted was a book and pencils as friends. But, of course, those around me who knew me well knew that I, like everybody else, needed attention and needed support. So, during the days that I along with my brother and a few of our friends would meet in the school’s conference for Public Speaking club, the entire group would write poetry instead of speeches. My friends there would force me (as in offer me Reese’s) to write about different things and use the best similes, metaphors, double entendres, etc., I could think of. That balance of being in class and disassociating myself from others was good for focus and creating new ideas, despite me becoming too antisocial, tagged along with having a room where I could enjoy what I’ve written and share it with friends was pretty good.

My goal is to one day find the time to write something as beautiful as my favorite poem, Cadenus and Vanessa by Jonathan Swift.

As diverse as my family background is, I would love to see the many different “homelands” I come from. One of those homelands is the beautiful island of Puerto Rico. Of course, before anything else, I wish the best for everybody there, family or not, affected by the storms. Let’s hope they are still keeping the energy up and making it through day by day.

A few years back, my uncle Darrin, who was in a committed relationship with his Puerto Rican girlfriend, Stella, decided that it was time to get married. And it would be super romantic for the ceremony to take place on the island, of course. As beautiful as destination weddings are, they are the perfect initiators of heart attacks for the common man’s bank account. Needless to say, I was very excited to go, because no bills were coming my way.

My brother shared in on the enthusiasm I felt to be heading to the place we’ve heard about growing up. We were so happy to be able to see the province with our own eyes; it was almost dreamlike. From the moment we stepped off the plane and weaved through the streets of San Juan, we were enticed by every bright colored building facade and every smell coming from restaurants. We imagined trekking through the foliage and making our way to different villages etc. But, the hotel pool was a good alternative.

We stayed at La Concha hotel downtown, a beautifully designed building with spacious accommodations, two pools, a gym, and the beach right out back. It wasn’t exactly the cultural enriching experience we had previously hoped for, but nobody at that age turns down random pool parties  for a walk to an old village. I thoroughly enjoyed being in the presence of native Spanish speakers while staying there; it felt surreal in a sense. At the time, when you’re used to your own life at home, you go to a new place, constantly hearing new words, always partaking in new foods, being in a culture not entirely mimicking your own; it really hit me. This was not my home, but it was A home, it belonged to somebody who lived with my blood coursing through their veins. From there, I was in a state of constant euphoria… it was a place I felt attached to.

On one day in particular, my dad, grandma, aunt, her husband, my brother and I made a run to Old San Juan, probably one of the chillest places I’ve ever been. The homes were modestly sized yet seemed as if they housed royalty. The architecture was visually pleasing to say the very least, it sets the portion of the city apart from all the rest of it. While there, we ate from a nice diner near the Plaza de Armas  and took pictures overlooking the ocean. I imagined myself as one of those pirates who shows up to a settlement to see where he could go, no real plans or direction. This was my foothold in an expanding world, connections to more places were on the way.

I have 3 other places that I need to go to in order to say I’ve completed the search for all of my “homelands.” We shall look at those soon.