Spoken Word: Dear Young Man of Color

Fong Tran

I'VE BEEN followed by a store clerk. I've seen women clutch their purses as I approach them. I simmer when a hostess seats me at the worst table in the restaurant and I shrug my shoulders when empty cabs pass me by. 

Every time I go through airport security, I am always singled out for a pat down.
The security guard apologizes and explains that I was randomly chosen. But I know that's a lie. Always. Singled. Out!

I know I'm not alone in these experiences that accumulate like a thousand cuts that shape our world views, mold our self-image, our dreams and expectations.

In a sense, I'm lucky. I'm not Trayvon Martin or Michael Brown. I can't even compare my life to theirs. And though my experiences can't match theirs, I can understand their anger and frustration by magnifying my feelings 100-fold. What we share, though, is that we're men of color.

Meet Fong Tran. A graduate of UC Berkeley, he's found a home in nearby Davis where he's a program advisor at the Cross Cultural Center at UC Davis.

He stumbled on poetry, or spoken word, accidentally. Looking for an easy grade, he enrolled in a poetry class at Cal. What he discovered was that he had things to say and say them in a powerful way. He was able to move people to tears.

Tran is now sought as a performer across California and his reputation is spreading nationally. "Dear Young Man of Color" is dedicated to the Sacramento Boys and Men of Color Coalition.

By Fong Tran

Dear Young Man of Color,

I want to begin this letter by saying that I’m sorry
I’m sorry because statistically speaking….

you will become a statistic

that numbers about you and your kind
will run off
like the dates, names, numbers and descriptions
of newspaper Obituaries

Latino males ages Ten to Twenty Four
Nineteen times more likely to be murdered than White counterparts
Two point one million inmates in the prison
Forty point one percent% of them are made up of African Americans
Thirty Nine point six percent% of Southeast Asian Males drop out of high school

You will be America’s most wanted
because you will be America’s most hated stereotype
Thug, Thief, Delinquent, terrorist
murderer, criminal, felon, hoodlum, Gangbanger, Ex-con, Etc.
you will be every policemen’s profile description

They use everything about you, against you
first it was eugenics and they said it was in your genes
then they blamed your hip-hop culture and not the crack dope fiends
but the music was to liberate us
then told control of it
now all it does is break our trust
man, we used to believe in it
then Miley Cyrus appropriated everything
and starting twerking on it

And you’re probably thinking
how’s this Asian kid hood enough
you’re confused
why this model minority
is telling you about oppression
but trust me when I say
there is nothing model about my life
section 8 housing, welfare checks and food stamps
becomes my families helicopter dropped foreign aid
and trust me when I say
that there nothing more gangsta
than have parents that hustle loaves of bread
in destitute Pilipino refugee camps for 8 months

But you see they try to pit us against each other

They force us to play oppression Olympics
but this shit is more like the hunger games
and people are looking to assassinate you
that even though you bear historical scars of slavery
and fucked up immigrant policy
you will be hunted down
they will be coming in packs
and you struggle with minimum wage rags
to hold back the bleeding
they will be coming like the angry villagers
and you will be their needle in their haystacks
and prison industrial complex is the testament
how they will burn the whole house just to get to you

But you will be resilient
you will overcome
that even though everything
will be against you
you are exactly what this world needs
they put you behind bars
just so you wouldn’t raise it
let me make it clear
that even though you start from the bottom
you change society beyond here

you must be the unexpected
the underdog
the unforeseen
the unruly
you will break the molds
Shake status quo,
deconstruct the powers that be
that even though we’ve had innocent fallen
soldiers like Trayon Martin, Fong Le, Jose Montoya
you follow the blood lines and legacy of
Che Cavara, Malcolm X and Richard Aoki

you are destined beyond the statistics that binds you down
it is all a facade, a mirage in the distance
made to hide your greatness

but you will be a champion
you will not let this world change you

you will change this world

Sincerely,

Brother from another Mother

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