Good Daughter2 min read

Illustration by Arty Guava

You nod your head
through the bitter taste of dread
that threatens to stain the smile
you perfected on the kitchen tile.
You do as you’re told:
be kind, be sweet, but not too bold.
Be good, be gentle, and not too loud,
you are as much as you’re allowed.

You are such a Good Daughter
because blood is thicker than water.
Shoulder your mother’s misery
and your father’s defensive artillery.
These are your family heirlooms,
at least that’s what the Good Daughter assumes.
Blood or water, it matters none;
not when you can drown in either one.

Be the Good Daughter,
enough so they’ll applaud her.
Bottle up your muted rage,
keeping it deep behind your ribcage.
Just repeat the beliefs of your parents,
do it all to keep up the appearance
of the perfect poster child
for the devoted and the mild.

I watch you stay the Good Daughter,
leading your life to the slaughter.
If obedience is your family gene,
then complacency is your routine.
You taste the bitter dread
but you still nod your head.
You can be bold and you can be loud,
but you limit yourself to what is allowed.

You will drown in blood
before there is even a flood.
You will speak your parents’ brand
before you yourself ever take a stand.
You will die the Good Daughter,
being everything her parents ever taught her.

Eunice C. Der 谢绍君 (she/her) is a Chinese Canadian poet, writer, and emerging museum professional in Toronto. She completed her HBA at the University of Toronto, where she studied English, Material Culture and Semiotics, and East Asian Studies. She is also an award-winning researcher and her literary and academic works have appeared before in Ricepaper Magazine, Muse Magazine of the Canadian Museums Association, and the first three volumes of The Material Merge. She is now an Education Museum Associate at ALPHA Education and the WongAvery Asia Pacific Peace Museum.