"Boat People" by Joshua Nguyen

"I wrote the poem ‘Boat People’ after reflecting on both Hurricane Maria and Hurricane Harvey. Throughout this time, the president was making a fool of himself in Puerto Rico, throwing paper towels into the crowds, and also criticizing people in Texas who were on boats during the flooding. My parent’s house flooded. My sister sent me a picture of my father and my cousin trudging through chest-level water trying to get out of their neighborhood. Through this tragedy, I saw people act as true neighbors and help each other out. I saw the resiliency of the people of Houston. At the same time, the president was spewing xenophobic rhetoric, which some of my own family agreed with. I wrote the poem to express the parallels between the Vietnamese people fleeing to America, many of them labeled “Boat People”, and the image of my family treading high waters during Hurricane Harvey. Another parallel I wanted to show was the fear of the Vietnamese coming to America and the current fear of immigrants coming to America. And the hypocrisy coming from my own family."

Nationhood and Other Scams