When you ask me where im going pdf

Perfect for fans of Rupi Kaur and Elizabeth Acevedo, Jasmin Kaur’s stunning debut novel is a collection of poetry, illustrations, and prose.

scream
so that one day
a hundred years from now
another sister will not have to
dry her tears wondering
where in history
she lost her voice

The six sections of the book explore what it means to be a young woman living in a world that doesn’t always hear her and tell the story of Kiran as she flees a history of trauma and raises her daughter, Sahaara, while living undocumented in North America.

Delving into current cultural conversations including sexual assault, mental health, feminism, and immigration, this narrative of resilience, healing, empowerment, and love will galvanize readers to fight for what is right in their world.

PM> Install-Package _When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig -Version 4.8.21 -Source https://www.myget.org/F/vnuc/api/v3/index.json

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> nuget.exe install _When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig -Version 4.8.21 -Source https://www.myget.org/F/vnuc/api/v3/index.json

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> dotnet add package _When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig --version 4.8.21 --source https://www.myget.org/F/vnuc/api/v3/index.json

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<PackageReference Include="_When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig" Version="4.8.21" />

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source https://www.myget.org/F/vnuc/api/v3/index.json

nuget _When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig  ~> 4.8.21

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> choco install _When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig --version 4.8.21 --source https://www.myget.org/F/vnuc/api/v2

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Import-Module PowerShellGet
Register-PSRepository -Name "vnuc" -SourceLocation "https://www.myget.org/F/vnuc/api/v2"
Install-Module -Name "_When-You-Ask-Me-Where-Im-Going-by-Jasmin-Kaur-Ebook-Epub-PDF-jig" -RequiredVersion "4.8.21" -Repository "vnuc" 

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Description: scream
so that one day
a hundred years from now
another sister will not have to
dry her tears wondering
where in history
she lost her voice

The six sections of the book explore what it means to be a young woman living in a world that doesn’t always hear her and tell the story of Kiran as she flees a history of trauma and raises her daughter, Sahaara, while living undocumented in North America.

Delving into current cultural conversations including sexual assault, mental health, feminism, and immigration, this narrative of resilience, healing, empowerment, and love will galvanize readers to fight for what is right in their world.

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Dedication to ishleen and all the other kids who seldom see themselves in books there is nothing gentle about these poems. even the flowers dripping from my tongue sharpen their edges on glass. douse themselves in propane. prepare their petals for war. Contents Cover Title Page Dedication skin (n) muscle (n) lung (n) nerve (n) heart (n) light (n) Notes Acknowledgments About the Author Praise Books by Jasmin Kaur Back Ad Copyright About the Publisher skin (n) the outermost layer of a body. a sheathing. an organ. a protective covering. a composition of dead cells that comprises most of the dust within a home. that which is seen first. that which hides the rest. a wall between the earth and my soft psyche. an unmissable thing. a curious thing. a shameless thing. a migratory thing. an organic human history. a burning building your eyes roam. a neon sign. an altar for worship. the place where we first met. a beacon of light. a blaring siren system. a kind of refuge at the very edge of a cliff. and what is it about the skin? it’s where they draw all their conclusions. my skin (and everything carried on it) is the first me you will encounter unless you’re meeting my words before you’ve met my face if that’s the case, i’m excited. it means that this is one of those rare and beautiful moments when everything inside of me is going to matter more than everything outside of me. this neighborhood is hushed whispers from those who will only graze her perimeter. this neighborhood is clean-cut, harmless houses and the stifled stories they are home to. this neighborhood is a surveillance camera made for children tangled up in something hollow while their parents are tangled up in money for the mortgage. husbands who smile for their wives. wives who cry for their sons. because of their sons. because of their daughters. and sometimes because of their husbands. this neighborhood is an unwanted migration of punjab to the promise of soil fertile enough to replant roots. this neighborhood is twelve hours sifting through berries and hours more hoping that aching backs and hands and minds will one day come to fruition. this neighborhood is a white woman who tells me that i live in a dangerous place but that it should be fine for people like me. this neighborhood shouts. and throbs. and breaks. but she has never failed to plant hope. call us concrete children children broken by the cracks children in the sidewalk or turned out okay despite the odds call us unworthy children. children born on the wrong parallel children of the wrong side of the earth children call us unteachable immigrant children or angry brown or your success story or simply call us children. so that for once that is what we are allowed to be. inspired by tupac shakur’s “the rose that grew from concrete” some boys break boys who look just like them because somewhere along the line they were taught that when they are hurt someone else must hurt more and the cops know their stories to begin and end with bullets escaping guns. or weed exchanging hands. or their clothing. or their skin. but i’ve seen what they tuck behind their locked-door eyes. the way their mouths harden up before they cry. / sabar / patience some mothers wear patience far too gracefully. it is the shawl draped over her shoulders every time her son walks out the front door with no regard for the ones still suffocating in this house it is the scarf calmly covering her head hiding the black dahlias on her neck it is the intricate pashmina wrapped around her body when i see her catching tears in cloth or hiding bloodshot eyes behind the protection of her chuni or wiping all the sadness away with the very thing that she refuses to remove. product recall in this world worth is defined by the way poreless skin stretches across correctly chiseled bone by the places where fat strategically stores itself by the obedience we hold against our own heads—safety removed as we discard all the pieces of us that do not fit within the plastic mold. / pakka rang / ripened color when they whisper that the heat of her mother’s womb must have turned her skin to ash she laughs because they cannot see all the god in a body draped in earth and fire and gold all at once. an open letter to south asians but what if you get dark is to say that dark bodies don’t let light in is to say that there is something dirty about the biological makeup of skin is to say that some people are born clean and need to keep it that way is to say that you don’t hate black people but you thank god you weren’t born one. so roop stares into the bathroom mirror and prepares her face for a fistfight. the foundation is two shades too light, so she does her best to smoothly blend it into her neck. her mom walks in and wanders her skin with her eyes. and her grandma walks in and nods. and her aunt walks in and tells her that the guests have arrived. the guests are polite. they talk about the family’s health. they talk about the price of houses. they talk about the leadership race. but they don’t talk about roop’s face. and nothing good or bad is noted of her. and this time, it seems as if the camouflage has worked. i’m trying to settle into my body feel comfortable inside its walls stay long enough to decorate each room sit at peace within me i’m trying to come home to myself i really am but you underestimate the way eyes can knock on doors and break through windows and tear down foundations how eyes can whisper and laugh and scream you underestimate the way hate can pull me to tears and push me to leave once again. kes (n) the uncut hair kept by sikhs as a means of recognizing the divinity within one’s natural form. an expression of love. a sense of freedom from the ideals of consumeristic and eurocentric beauty sunday. you catch the corner of a mirror and can’t help but notice the strand of hair. always bolder. always louder than before but you tell yourself that there are flowers growing from your skin. monday. the train is a cacophony of beings. humans as lost and hopeful as you and you can’t help but weave stories of their struggles between each stop but their eyes drown in your sight. he glares. you smile back. tuesday. you find yourself consumed with glass. rectangles and squares and prisms and shards that are always painful no matter the dullness of the edges. wednesday. she turns to you in class. after months of small talk she musters up the nerve to say do you mind if i ask you a question? you nod. you already know what it is. thursday. you’re trying to hide from glass. but your body was not made only to run. what if you slowed your pace long enough to listen to your skin? friday. you stumble upon a mirror. but before you can escape you catch your eye on a glimmer of light. there is something glowing just beneath the surface of the being before you. saturday. you crown yourself. this time taller this time willfully you seek all the stories locked within each softened layer of cloth wrapped around your head. today, these stories are enough. sunday. you encounter flowers scattered across your skin for the first time, you stop to sit among them. woman with scandalized eyes turns away from me and speaks to her friend speaks to me in all the silent ways that matter says thick brows are okay but messy brows are not says this must be part of my culture says she is sorry about my culture says there is one way to be a woman and this is not it. inspired by key ballah’s “for the loves of my life” the ideal sikh girl only radiates grace across her hairless face she is born with so little in need of fixing that they will stare deciding whether or not her form has been altered until the corner of her eye catches the heat of their gaze when they finally realize that it is only nature who has been so kind to her they will no longer hide the hunger in their eyes as they inform her that she is beautiful. i’m not here to be your example of the good girl until i’m your warning sign for the wayward one / nooh / daughter-in-law her mother repeats a familiar invocation recites the words that have already gone stale in her mouth treat her no differently than you would treat me remember that they are your family now their home is your real home but it is not yours do not overstep their bounds or let your tongue get comfortable they are yours and they are not they are yours but they will not love you despite it all and so she leaves to not her home. babygirl didn’t your mother ever teach you that when these hips widen into the earth’s arch, this body will no longer be yours? you will be baptized into womanhood by all the eyes that own you. on trial girl no older than thirteen stares up into the eyes of humanity and apologizes for the gaze of men humanity no jury to be blinded by a bleeding heart remains unconvinced of her sincerity. my name is not sheila but i’m wondering if i have the right to a jawani or a life all in which i am not pulled apart hip by hip. in bollywood a woman is meant to remain calm while fifty-three men encircle her with mouths watering just as calm as she must remain in each of these streets where her compliance keeps her alive. munni badnaam hui but her attackers still walk the streets honor intact because every single day in the world’s largest democracy™ the word izzat takes precedence over the testimonies of ninety-five women and god knows how many other whose voices have been stifled. when durga stepped out into the battlefield her oppressors’ heads hanging from her neck i wonder if she was met with respect or whether they viewed her skin as a land that hadn’t yet been conquered. down aisle six on a shelf that’s not too hard to reach is barbie. packaged in pretreated plastic barbie has a propensity for promiscuity all the features they want of her: lips full, hips curved, eyes bright barbie’s arms don’t bend but she can get down on her knees made to please those with a moment’s attention she is labeled, branded, and set on display waiting rigidly for ken to glance in her direction trying to fill that hollow space between molded layers of peach plastic but can you really blame her? she didn’t place herself in that box. they taught her that hell existed at the curve of her waist. because the shape of her body left boys wanting. tempted them like apples hanging from trees. like fruit that wanted to be picked. made their minds wander. left too much to the imagination. too little to the imagination. he taught her that hell existed in the hourglass of her being in the small of her back in the movement of her legs when he invaded her because the sin was too tempting and she prayed for forgiveness. boys with microphones love to talk about queens love to separate the humans from the hoes love to sexualize the intelligence of women love to tell you that you are not like the other women love to praise women so women will want them. / kode-svich / code-switch why should my tongue choke on itself for my intelligence to be proven? i will not call my voice colloquial when yours is always welcome in its natural form. my words nach between two languages fighting over them. my thoughts travel the earth before i collect them. and if they need to be described in a boli that sounds barbaric to ears that don’t know how to hold them so be it. i will not italicize all the parts of myself that make no sense to you. you are the wrong kind of writer. the kind that doesn’t always have the right words and seldom has them in the right order. your commas pretend to be periods and your metaphors sometimes spill over the edges of convention. you sit in bookstores cross-legged at the bottom of the shelves. love too many of the books and take none of them home. your lines don’t usually fill up the entire page and your english teacher usually fails you for not fleshing out your thoughts. most times, there just aren’t enough words. there are enough stories, but there sure as hell aren’t enough words. you don’t have snap-worthy sentiments about love but you know what it is to fall asleep during a graveyard shift and lay awake for hours waiting for no one to come home. the english is still unkind. still scrapes the bottom of your tongue on its way out and the metal on your pencil still scrapes the paper where the eraser is worn. you tell me all the stories, sitting cross-legged at the bottom of the shelves. you think they will never find their way into the stacks above us unless another hand scribes them. one without so many calluses. one more familiar with poignancy than honesty. when i was ten years old, i had no idea that chimamanda ngozi adichie would one day describe the danger of a single story but there was a moment. a definitive moment. when her words hung low in the air in this very desi public-school classroom. when a man much older than us. much more powerful than us. and much paler than the little punjabi faces that looked up at him. was angered by the actions of a few boys in our class. he said you boys act like this because indo-canadian dads have no manners. because they treat you like little princes. because they have no respect and when you are ten years old and punjabi you don’t talk back to adults. let alone your teacher. but you wonder things that you cannot yet wrap your entire heart around. like how can he talk about my dad when he’s never met my dad before and why are we all in trouble when two boys did something wrong and are our families really as bad as he says they are so you grow up searching for answers between the covers of books and conversations on twitter and your own tongue that begins to grow poems. but some of the questions only become dense and bottomless. a well within you soon overflowing with murky water. like what if they call this one story every single story and what if they read these words and think they have walked these very same halls and can i tell my people what i saw without a white man interrupting to tell us that he was right i add myself to the dictionary set our skin tones to default remove the wavy red lines under every name and tear down the borders they built on each page. if you love writing about the way your tongue has been stolen from its mother but cannot see those from your motherland within you believe me when i say that the colonizer has already strangled and swallowed you whole. he tells me he doesn’t care about politics and i am lost. i am a brown woman born on land stolen, sacrificed and then silenced. i am a brown woman born into a body that turns heads that only house glares. glares that ask me to leave. mouths that spit blood toward my kind. hands and fists and forces that want to push me back to where i come from. while where i come from screams in ways that go unheard. where i come from is buried under blistering earth and burning minds that are set aflame by a state that brings kerosene instead of water when my people are thirsty. where i come from is being dug out of the dried soil by people young enough and old enough to demand more than justice from those who have tried and failed to crush them. he tells me he doesn’t care about politics and i wonder if he can see the political boundaries on my body—the conflict zones between my shoulder blades. the border built between my tongue and me. the partition carved into my palms. all the ways in which it is political for me to live. the sun rises & israel drags his feet across gaza’s chest. settles across her skin & waits empty-eyed for it to tear & a white man sits atop amerikkka & calls brown skin a furnace. says that we consume each other in smoke & flame. that it is better we burn each other to ash than intrude on his property & a cop in punjab empties out a cartridge. cleans it out in a young singh’s body & names it necessity. decides to side with a system that puts food on the table & bodies in rivers & a woman floats in space. stares at the earth as the sun cowers behind it. watches existence light up in twinkling cities & villages. wishes humanity could step back to stare at itself. undocumented what is purgatory but to meet no place that calls you beloved to find no earth with arms that embrace you to swim only in rushing rivers and never rest beneath the sun where do you go when each floor of the house you built is on fire & the cold hearted encircle you bullets loaded in their mouths demanding that you go back to where you came from it’s true. we were never welcome here. those of us with sun-showered skin and generations of rebellion dancing beneath our rib cages not aching to make our struggles romantic nor to kiss the word exotic like a compliment not simply searching for another way to say that our legs must stretch & tear to plant feet in two continents but instead walking toward a justice that cannot be commodified. one that cannot be softened and sold back to us. in this body i am a work of art that will face unsolicited critique a wrong answer on a test that i never agreed to take & a set of rules that have undoubtedly been broken but i would be lying if i told you that this skin does not hold me close because in every shade of neon their disdain and curiosity is drawn to me and all the while i glow. muscle (n) the tissue responsible for movement. propels action. sets the story of this body in motion. expands and contracts without crumbling. pulls away. pulls in. then fills all this space once again. strengthens when torn. but it hurts. and that can seldom be avoided. when torn. when teaching itself how to heal. it only knows how to fill more of the room than before. listens closely to feeling. to the fluctuating colors i carry. knows its way around my anger and responds in love. in outrage. lets itself be consumed with blood. meets both fight and flight. prepares for the consequences of either one. but what if muscle doesn’t fully heal? it makes itself heard. the next time you ask me where i’m going please recall that i am three parts indecision and one part reckless abandon that i have seldom bothered to look back at the wreckage i’ve left in my wake and will never be bothered to master the flames at my fingertips anyways i am not your poem. i was never your brushstroke. i am not your tragedy or your failed attempts to find meaning. i was never an answer to a question so when you ask me like dawn if i will rise to your occasion do not be disappointed when i reply with the dusk that is all i’ve ever known. they say you’re angry. with your loudmouth response to everything. with your mess where they expect organization. you undo all their seams just to prove you can do them yourself. greet demands for silence with rushing water. walk out the doors and over the lines to remind yourself that you can. coat your knuckles in brass beneath the skin. meet the feet on your body with all the shrapnel on your tongue. swallow outrage and spit it back out. never leave without an answer. never end without the last word. snap back when you feel suffocated. always more than necessary. seldom enough to compensate for that deep dark fear of cages.