Nearly three years here
I know I’m still new
I still get a weird feeling about
the Westside, it’s true
maybe it
reminds me too much of home,
in another county,
too much of the
suburban dissonance,
the distance between
one sidewalk and the other,
the strip malls, the chain
restaurants–the fast ones
and the expensive ones,
the boutiques that remind me
of the other beach farther
south where I always
felt like an Other,
economically
if not ethnically
there’s something about it
that makes me uneasy
I need some dirt,
some roots
breaking up concrete,
some wildly blooming,
un-tamed bushes,
a different kind
of desolation,
but, still,
that’s just my gut
based only
on limited exploration
and really,
I hated Downtown, too, once
before I gave it a chance
and got to know it.
So I have a feeling
there’s still hope
and I know
there’s much to be found
over there,
on the Westside,
and there are still
some Orange County
traumas to heal.
narinda heng 