grandma's hands
by Karo Ska

For the first twelve years
of my life, my mom said:
you're 75% Polish, 25% Indian
who was I
 
to not believe her? But she lied,
manipulated the numbers in her desire
for me to be white, announcing you
were raised in poland, as if this changed
 
my genetic fragments. Today I seek
another version of the truth, order
a DNA test, on sale 30% off.
I want scientific percentages, I want
 
to know who painted the hieroglyphics
in my veins. Was I switched
at birth? Did my mom pick a man's
name at random? Will they send
 
me grandma's gentle hands
through the mail? My father says
to be Bengalee you must
speak the language.
 
I am not Bengalee. I am not
American or Polish. I wish
 
I was 100%
intentional, instead I am
48% South Asian, 48% Eastern
European & 4% Indus Valley,
 
100% obscure, no links to ancestry
dot com's genetic communities,
they deny me
a family too, give me
 
distant European cousins. I don't claim
national-border identities. A river
flows from a plateau, spills
into a sea, connects
 
to an ocean, trembles
at my LA River's edge. I touch
the water, I feel a pull,
maybe I'm reaching
 
but I can hear my ancestors
speaking. My dripping fingers weave
gnarled amino acids, revealing
an ancient script: I was not intentional
 
yet I’m here, digging for sweet
muddy acceptance, following
my tangled roots. In India,
archaeologists uncover a Rakhigarhi
 
burial site, siphoning DNA
from a four-thousand-year-old ear
bone, proving we, South Asians
descend from her
 
Indus magic. Grandma's gentle hands
don't arrive in the mail,
but she's listening
as am I.