My immigrant father loves the produce section of the grocery store. In peer-reviewed applications of maturation pseudoscience, he knocks politely on whole watermelons, volunteer canvasses Valencia neighborhoods of teetering multiplicities: oranges from California, mangoes from Mexico, and apricots from South Africa. I reckon some time ago we would have called the fruit exotic, but the thought sends shivers up my spine. We move through the aisles, and he brings a cantaloupe to my ear, like I could echolocate seeds being baptized under pockmarked skin. I hear nothing but say it’s a good one. On the weekends we carry home bags of carrots, potatoes, three cucumbers, oranges, and maybe apples if the timing is right. My dad doesn’t believe in the farmer’s market.
On Monday, I practice assimilation at school: cut navel oranges into eighths, gerrymander flesh vesicles, leave orange pith underneath nails—enough for lunch.
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Isabel Yang/Z. Y. Yang/杨振宇 (they/her) is a writer, poet, and haver of many names. They were born in Wuhan, China and grew up in Alberta, mostly in and around Edmonton, where they currently live and write on Treaty 6 Territory. Their poems have appeared in Room, Poetry is Dead, and Plenitude, among other publications. You can send them cat pictures on Twitter @sblyang or visit them at sblyang.wordpress.com.