Metamorphosis
as a girl i wanted to be a mermaid. metamorphosize from girlchild with two legs to girlchild with one tail, scales & all. the opposite of The Little Mermaid, my favorite Disney princess. at the local YMCA, i swam in the shallow end, imagining my two feet kicking as one fin. i never made it to the deep end. at two years old i had my first & only surgery in my ear canal. i heard the canals in Venice will soon be empty by the time i’m fifty, perhaps sooner. Ariel lost her voice for a man & all i ever wanted was to become the sea women i fixated on: the mermaids in The Little Mermaid & H2O, Katara in Avatar: The Last Airbender. as a child i played with water in the tub, pretending i could control its ripples with my bare hands. bend water to my will instead of water bending my will. the first time i remember being on a boat, i threw up. as a pubertygirlteenager i wanted to be a daughter of Poseidon, until i learned the story of Medusa. what would it be like to be a siren, beckoning men who harmed you and devouring them whole? as a womanyoungadult i discovered my moon is in pisces. the moon rules over the tides & i, too, wanted to become the moon. my partner calls me their moon. as a womanyoungadult i read an article about Jeju’s haenyeo and a year later i saw the sea women, their heads bobbing underneath the surface of the water, deep diving their destinies. their black suits dots on the clear water, masterful against the island’s sharp waves. heritage :: history :: here :: sea women of my country.
Email I Never Sent
Hello X,
I hope you’re doing well and taking care and hanging in there as the world in late stage capitalism collapses imminently before us. I wish I could be honest with you. You see, I hate writing emails. I write one and it takes me twenty minutes to send. I re-read every word and overthink every punctuation use. I add an exclamation point! Two!! Erase. Zero. Does this come off as urgent? Do I seem too earnest? Am I getting my message across in a clear and succinct way? Am I going to bother you? I most definitely am going to bother you. I’ve re-read the same email ten times & haven’t changed anything about it. I hate writing emails but I have to communicate to you somehow.
I wanted to reach out. Do you feel the same useless restless sentiment as I do writing this? Can you tell me it’s okay to step away for once? Can you tell me it’s okay to turn off my notifications? The world will keep spinning even if I never check my email again. Can you please send me your availability next week when you get the chance? By chance, do you have nothing scheduled on your calendar? How freeing would it be to do nothing? Be nothing. Write nothing. Nothing.
Thank you feels so hard to say nowadays. I keep a daily gratitude journal. Today it is ‘I am alive.’ Tomorrow it will be ‘I am alive.’ Please let me know if you have any questions.Please tell me how to stop checking my email. Please tell me how to look away from my phone for more than one minute. Please tell me when the internet became an extension of myself. Please tell me how to live.
Sincerely,
X
Triptych: Multiverse
Six months into my relationship, I tell my parents I have a girlfriend.
They stare at me. Umma blinks; appa coughs. Umma reaches for my hand across the table. Hers are worn, calloused from nights at the nail salon. Appa asks me one question: are you happy? | They stare at me. Faces aren’t blank, but it is the only way I know how to describe how they looked: as if a god had stolen their features. Appa asks me one question: why? | They stare at me. They look at each other, umma’s mouth drawn in a frown, appa’s face cold as steel. Umma asks me one of many questions: wasn’t that all a phase? |
| Yes, I answer. The happiest I’ve ever been. To know love is to know this: the sunlight on her face as she pouts, making pancakes; the way they squeeze my hand in a crowd, calming my claustrophobia; lying in bed next to her, counting their breaths to fall asleep. | Umma says: go. It takes me two minutes to pack my bags. The door is already open for me to leave. To their god, I am a sin. My partner is a sin. Collectively, we are the biggest sin. The streetlight blinks out, erasing my shadow. Forgive me, father. I am sin. | For the past few years, I had built a house of cards around the three of us, carefully placing each card on top of each other: card of the law-abiding, god-fearing, heterosexual daughter; card of the protected daughter who tells her parents nothing; card of the naive daughter who convinced herself lying was the only way. |
| Appa tells me one thing: as long as you’re happy, we are happy. Umma asks me one of many things: which letter do you belong to? What is her name? How did you meet? Do you understand what love is now? | On Christmas Eve, umma texts me: we are praying for you. I do not text her back. I imagine my parents at church, kneeling on the floor, hands cupped in prayer, thumbs against their noses. A soft murmur: God, bring our daughter back. | They tell me: we want you to be happy. They tell me: we’re afraid for you. I tell them: I am happy. I tell them: I was afraid to tell you. They tell me: we are sorry. I tell them: I am sorry. They tell me: we are trying to understand. I tell them: I am trying. We are trying. |
Monica Kim (she/her) is a queer Korean diasporic writer and social justice worker living in Brooklyn, New York. She is a first reader at Augur Magazine, a prose editor at Mag 20/20 for Issue 06, a 2022 Watering Hole fellow, and a 2023 Periplus fellow. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Gulf Coast Journal, SUSPECT, A Velvet Giant, and other publications.
The Marbled Sigh 