GO FOR BROKE HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGE ESSAY, POETRY AND VIDEO CONTEST: What They Need to Know …

First Prize, Poem, College

Miya Eberlein

UCLA

Sophomore (2016-17 Academic School Year)

Growing up Japanese American,

I knew camp did not mean summer camp

I knew that freedom did not come free

That my ancestors fought so I could be

Far away from barbed wire fences

I do not need to pack all my things in one suitcase

I do not need to leave my home

With the orange trees in the backyard

That they once had to say goodbye to

In history books

The uprooting of my family tree

The day 9066 was posted

Is but a small sentence in the book

It is an afterthought

Not even an apology

My friends they do not know

They do not know enough

Of the hot, cracked clay grounds

That my great grandparents speak about

The sore summer days of missing Okasan

Yearning for life back home

Separated from the world

Alien

So if the books do not speak

I teach them myself

Their eyes grow wide in horror

Why have we never learned about this?

I tell them more

About the loyalty

As we banded together

Even when our freedom was taken

We fought for the freedom of the nation

That is what they need to know…

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