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My dad was born in Lombok, Indonesia, and immigrated to the U.S. in the ’90s. Growing up, I only caught glimpses of his culture and life in Indonesia. One day in an art history class, I read an article about migration and identity that discussed the hybridity of culture created when someone physically crosses a border and occupies new space. I thought of my dad and the ways my family participates in Indonesian and Balinese traditions. It made me think about what our family’s hybrid culture looks like. This poem is an exploration of these sentiments. 

Swimming

I never used to be afraid of the ocean. Only how rough it could get. 
But then I learned that sharks feed at sunset. 
And I never liked going to the beach at that time.

Suddenly, I was always scared of the water.
Not the water—
But of being surrounded by something I couldn’t see into.

Underneath me and all around me: unknowns.

I never went to the beach all that much when I lived in Florida.
When I moved to Washington, I remember washing my hands after I got home from school and thinking how grateful I was for hot water.
I had never needed it until then, so I never thought of it as something to be grateful for.

There used to be a framed painting in our bathroom. 
It had ink lines of a diver and a dolphin.
I always thought it was a picture of my dad.

My mom would say he looked more comfortable in the sea than he did on land.
She said he moves differently underwater, not like I’ve ever seen before. He’s really a fish.

He could see underwater.
He wasn’t afraid. 
It was his home.

The water feels different on the West coast than I’m used to. It doesn’t feel as free. 
It feels like something that has lost its name. 
It moves like a body that can’t remember who they are, or who they were. 
A body that feels like they are a shadow
but can’t remember of who.

A shadow that belongs to nobody. That belongs to everybody.

What does the water feel like where you grew up, daddy?
Who taught you how to swim?
Was it the waves? the fish? 

You’re as unknown to me as the sea. 
I look at you
and I know the surface. 

But I can’t see underneath it.

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
Do you know? 
Can you remember?
I don’t remember who taught me how to swim.
But it feels like I’ve been swimming for my entire life.

daddy, did you know I was born with fish in my head?
They aren’t always there. And they didn’t look like this before.

But they are still here.
They swim around in my head and dirty the water until I can’t think straight or see anything.
Can you drown with fish in your head?

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
Can you remember?
Was it your mother?
Your uncles?
Does it feel like you’re still swimming?
Do you ever feel like you are drowning
Under the crushing weight of your existence

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
I told Ayu that you are the most adaptable person I know.
She said that’s because you learned how to survive out of necessity. 
You had no choice but to adapt.

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
You are like the ocean to me. 
An entity, 
so large it contains thousands of ecosystems and thousands of species.
Thousands of secrets and thousands of stories.

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
Was it the sea herself?

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
Do you ever yearn and ache for the sea?
To be a part of it.
To feel like water, 
once again. 

like water.

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
Was it the fish in your head?
Did I get them from you?

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
Did you adapt
And learn
Out of necessity?

Who taught you how to swim, daddy?
I love you. 
And I wish I knew.

daddy,

can you teach me how to swim?