more praise for
even this page is whiteeven this page is white is a provocative meditation on what it means to grow up anything other than white in Canada, tackling institutional racism and sexual identity from a unique viewpoint, all delivered with astute observation and trenchant insight. Rollie Pemberton, former Edmonton Poet Laureate Vivek Shraya radically centres radiant darkness in
even this page is white. In and around and between the lines I see multi-dimensional reflections of myself; all the possibilities of my becoming. Beasts are everywhere, outside and in, and Viveks words root my courage to face them in love-a-lutionary soil. dbi.young anitafrika, Canadian Poet of Honour With her debut poetry collection, Shraya applies her keen intelligence and awareness of positionality to white privilege and systemic racism. The books accessibility and attention to everyday racism will undoubtedly elicit comparisons to Claudia Rankines
Citizen: An American Lyric.PRISM international EVEN THIS PAGE IS WHITE Copyright 2016 by Vivek Shraya THIRD PRINTING: 2017 All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any part by any meansgraphic, electronic, or mechanicalwithout the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may use brief excerpts in a review, or in the case of photocopying in Canada, a license from Access Copyright. ARSENAL PULP PRESS Suite 202 211 East Georgia St. Vancouver, BC V6A 1Z6 Canada arsenalpulp.com The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the British Columbia Arts Council for its publishing program, and the Government of Canada (through the Canada Book Fund) and the Government of British Columbia (through the Book Publishing Tax Credit Program) for its publishing activities. 
The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the Toronto Arts Council for the writing of this book. 
indian was published in The Ethnic Aisle (February 2016) and prologue / gestation was published in This Magazine (March/April 2016). Poems. Poems.
ISBN 978-1-55152-641-6 (paperback) I. Title. PS8637.H73E84 2016 C811.6 C2016-901425-8
for anyone who has lost a friend from saying the word race
vivekthe page is always whitebecause it is a voida voidanceuntil ink cometh tomake it rightand blankness is destroyedand black words dance. george elliott clarke (december 2015)
if whiteness gains currencyby being unnoticedthen what does it meanto notice whiteness? sara ahmed Table of Contents
Guide
white dreamsto be anything in this world, you need to get a white person to like you. scaachi koul
white dreams i have white dreams billboards magazines mighty praise accolades top 10 lists and top 10 hits so i climb dodge boulders earn blisters but even the top of the mountain is white i have a white boy i top i dream on his long body as his past bodies have long built upon mine but when i cum on the dip in his spine even the colour of my pleasure is white. body you betray me the only brown i make for sewer but for him for him my brown body makes white makes nice if my cum was brown would he still eat it? from my core i seek courage but even my bones are white is it my skin that betrays this skeleton? i pray for answers for my dreams hunched back dim light blue ink blank paper knelt over wept over now i grasp why thirty-four years of praying through writing awoke no god even this page is white so i protest this page mask it with words words about being brown about my mother my motherland but even these words have white dreams billboards magazines crystal trophies because what are words without dreams and what is a dream if it is not white?
indian podium mic on remind them this land is not ours heads nod hands clap feet fixed are you even in the room? once my mother accidentally drove near a reserve the only time i have seen her afraid hit gas pedal strange to be indian and the sound of car locks to be synonymous with
indians is acknowledgement enough?
i acknowledge i stole this but i am keeping it social justice or social performance what would it mean to digest you and yours and blood and home and land and minerals and trees and dignities and legacies to really honour no show gratitude no word for partaking in violence in progress last year baltimore intersection black man approaches once again a finger reaches for car lock except this time the finger is mine.
amiskwacwskahikan so preoccupied with my own displacement didnt notice i was displacing you gave myself a white name adam in place of
divek civic ribbit didnt bother to learn yours
fairfor shamik your second mother when you had half a father my arm ever wrapped around your shoulder rolled macaroni burritos for your dinner knock knock jokes for your laughter but when they asked you
why are you so much darkerthan your brother called you the n word lingered for an answer all i did was bask.
antaryami he passes by doesnt notice your palms pushed together your palms wiping cement to collect dust dirt he stepped on to wipe over your face you used to sing
he is the indwellerof my heart you used to say
he likes the white followers more i was ten and attentive
if this is true at least im canadian a psyche so trampled to accept that even our guru our god prefers white over us.
even this stage voted
most annoying voice in junior high i knew you meant most faggot voice even when the yearbook committee changed the category to
most unique voice also voted
most talented singer most talented faggot ill take it earned it singing madonna disney at assemblies
a whole new world of pop requires a song to be sing-alongable if you cant sing with me like me the song doesnt echo has no value what if i dont sound like you? a voice molded by ragas and my mothers later roused by r&b riffs and emotion the closest semblance on radio to indian classical devotion whitney taught me a new way to pray but when i open my mouth im told
restraint sing lessfewer notes file this advice alongside other efforts to render my voice pleasing palpable reduce inflection lower pitch what if i dont sound like you? what if i dont look like you? bleached my hair learned guitar covered pearl jam u2 listeners still say
eastern influences reviews say vocals are
irritating acquired taste most annoying less fewer restrain reduce lower sometimes i forget that i know how to sing.
rajiyou have a twin worst thing to tell a queen
his name is raji i despise him already
who? i ask avert my eyes i guess
he is brown and tall no one says
and queer no one needs to i am told of my twin often with a snicker a secret joke on both of us hope we never meet i recognize my twin across the central academic building hallway so gangly his wrists scrape the floor giraffe neck rusty streaks in his mushroom haircut we pretend not to notice each other betrayed by the presence of the other he knows the precise strain and witchery to refashion deviance flamboyancy as extraordinary why would he take this away from me? so accustomed to being token his arrival obsoleted me two weeks later im told
