Under country, over country,
Never committed and always free,
But that’s freedom by plane, 
And not freedom of pain.

That pain hides in the greetings that are filled with goodbyes,
Our hello is rather uninviting, we realize.
But it’s a result of a normal routine 
Of always having to leave as the in-between.

Our looks deceive – 
We are not who you believe. 
We know both more thank you think,
And less than you think.

Yellow in the sea of Blue,
In the sea of Yellow, we are Blue.
Holding the knowledge of a Green
We are mistaken as pretentious, as causing a scene.

We return home
To absorb the culture of home, 
But Painters admire each color alone, 
For Black absorbs all, yet has no culture of its own.

Yet there’s beauty in Green! 
It’s not a fault to be in-between. 
But Painters are stubborn, 
Holding the old standard of one, they just don’t learn

That Green is both – it’s two – 
Not yellow, not blue.
Is that not so simple? 
Yet it remains incomprehensible.

You may know us as Global Citizens;
We carry the global burdens.
The dark eye bags remain as battle scars of jet-lag, 
Telling of the loss and grief from flag to flag.

Some of us live on the prayer cards on your fridge,
Between you and the 3rd world, we’re the bridge.
Existing as the good of the world in your sight, 
It is a fallacy we must rewrite.

If we didn’t bring our Sunday’s best
To visit your church to impress,
Perhaps you would be disillusioned, and the truth be known 
Of the dirt we bear, of the sin we own.

The truth is that we are scruffy
With the odor of our homes stuck to our shirts, a smell that is friendly,
Familiar because it is foreign,
Foreign to any other person.

If our real closet was opened, it would burst.
Culottes falling first, 
Hand-me-downs intertwined, 
Revealing our fashion – only 10 years behind!

The skin of a chameleon
Has granted us the chance of one in a million
To adapt, give, and share all before noon,
And before we’re gone, for our goodbyes come all too soon.

by Rachel Hudson