Sofia Abbas | abcd pt ii | Glass: A Journal of Poetry

November 11, 2026

Sofia Abbas

abcd pt ii

Dadi passed down a nose pin heirloom but it stays preserved

in 1999 because I don’t wear gold colored jewelry.

I’ve played grammar-check for Mom's work emails since I was eleven & I couldn't

help my chin from preening whenever touted pretty and ethnically

ambiguous in the same sentence. & while twirling

un-rhythmic shapes in elegant stiff fabric, this lehenga skirt

whirlpools a gas leak of discomfort

the likes of an appropriator.

ii.

I’ve worked kitchens since turning sixteen but still I won’t prepare

masor tenga without measurements. & my chin stales

straining for Larkana guava rivulets but my hair roots

oil at the thought of motherfatherland’s sweat-suctioned love.

iii.

equidistant in a fireproof lockbox are all my dusty friends

that never saw the inside of my house but I won’t ever bother probing

something safeguarded from burning. & I’ll try over again

at bilingual but there is no education quite like awkward phone calls

with extended family and their birthday wishes.

iv.

it is far more congested than mere hackneyed shame stretched the circumference

of my veins, far more cruel than resentment curling ugly

at parents who began raising me six days post 9/11. it is not simply

lukewarm self-chastening of the day Mama

turned into Mom and Baba into Dad.

I can’t say why I keep Dadi’s nose pin centered atop my dresser. forced under

its ichor gaze every morning. maybe to sustain a guilt that forever smolders

but neither fizzles to swept ash nor blooms an inferno

searing me into action. maybe I’ll simmer perfect humiliation

that will one day boil over into belonging. one day have me believe I am suited for gold.

"abcd pt ii" is part confessional, part love letter. What spurred this piece was a broken conversation I had with my grandmother over a video call. Broken because I cannot speak her language and she cannot speak mine. Over a call because she lives across the world. A few years ago she passed down to me a beautiful gold nose stud that I have yet to wear. During this call she asked me why I didn't wear it, her disappointment poorly disguised. Shame pooled and flooded and I responded with silence. I couldn't speak her language. This poem captures snapshots of this same scene with different props. The push and pull of culture and assimilation. The ebb and flow of gratitude and resentment. In its essence, "abcd pt ii" is an attempt to trade shame for humility.