Christian Konopasek-Vizcarra

Things I Can't Explain to My White Friends

I can’t explain

why my Spanish only comes out in the kitchen,

why it sounds different when I’m talking to my grandma

than when I’m ordering tacos after midnight.

Why I wear a cross I don’t pray to,

but still leave offerings when no one’s watching.

Why I feel more at home in silence

than small talk,

and why I don’t laugh when your dad says

“This country’s gone soft.”

Why I learned to shoot before I learned to shave.

Why I know what it feels like

to carry death in your hands

and still hold a child like you’re worthy of grace.

Why I wear my hair short now.

Why I used to grow it long.

Why both were a statement

even if I never said so out loud.

Why I didn’t say anything

when your uncle joked about “illegals” at the cookout,

but I haven’t been back to your house since.

Why I don’t flinch when things go bad.

Why I watch the exits in every room.

Why I never sit with my back to the door.

Why that’s not trauma it’s just a normal Tuesday.

Why I clench my jaw

when I hear the word redskin

used like it’s a team

instead of a slur carved from our dead.

Why I get quiet

not because I’m unsure

but because I know if I speak,

it won’t come out soft.

Why I don’t laugh

when you mock someone’s accent,

as if survival didn’t teach their tongue to twist

just to be understood.

Why it makes my blood boil

when someone says “illegals are stealing our jobs,”

as if my people didn’t build this country

before there were borders to cross.

Why I hate the hate

toward the trans service member,

the brown soldier,

the medic with an accent

who still bled red in the same dirt as me.

Why I’ve seen more honor

from a girl with testosterone in her veins

than from the men who said she didn’t belong.

Why I never felt white.

Why I’m not “ethnically ambiguous.”

Why I’m not half.

Why I’m full of things

you’ve never had to name.