Child of Tolerance by Denise Chou Allas

I am child of your eyes
Child of your fairy hair
Your father's delicate blood.

I am captive of your fragrant ovens
Captive of your daydream books
Your virgin poems.

I am twenty-seven and now grown up
You will not let me, Mama.
Although you let me go.

Flowers bear flowers, weeds bear weeds
You wish I were my sweet sister faraway
My brother in his golden tower

You have a wide heart, Mama, wisdom
In your bones-but not for me
Issue of your iron womb: black

Sheep, counterfeit lotus
I write you poems you will not read
I bake you bread you will not eat.

You cannot like youself, just
Cannot break the chains of your disdain
Prison of my child's landscape

But it's all right
You need not string the pearls on your cheeks
Around my neck

For I am child of your eyes
Your fairy hair
Your virgin poems

I am child of your primordial
Dreams. I cannot hate you
It will be my own death.

*Taken from Filipina I Poetry, Drama, Fiction by Women Writers in Media Now 1984