‘Two White Lines (Closer to You)’

Photograph “True Blue” by Chanwoo Min from Seoul, South Korea.

Two White Lines (Closer to You)

For the white guy, I guess

It is just the most tragic and awful thing

That could have happened. Chest compressed

And something amazing is going

To rise out of this, just you wait

It’s the age of the internet and everything’s taking off.

There you were like an amalgam of all my worst traits

The sloth and blood clots and the scoff

And the half-painted canvases too

Goddamn the visual artists, I’m convinced

They have it easier than me. All they have to do

Is let two white lines run down the page and rinse

Their brushes so the color spreads.

So apparently I feel very complicatedly

About this, the butchered words and the dreads

And the way you all so blatantly

Look the other way. And I even like you

Is the thing, but there’s no inspiration

In TSA inspection and the first class you flew

English class, kick my ass with your instigation.

The white guy stares up

At the sky and his poetry flows

Down the page like two white lines into a cup

Which I am drinking from now to get close

To you. I mean closer to you.

Saru Potturi is an Indian-American poet based in California. They received their B.A. in English from Pomona College. Saru's work has appeared in publications such as Wilderness House Literary Review and Agave Review, and draws heavily from their lived experience as a queer racialized minority.