Because nothing interesting happened at Sotomayor's hearing...

I would like to present a poem by the late 60's poet d. a. levy courtesy of oldpoetry.com

When i was a little kid
my parents never told me
i didn't find out until
i got out of high school
then when people asked me,
I ASKED THEM,
"NATIONALITY OR RELIGION?"

When i was a little kid
my parents brought me up as a christian
that when i discovered,
i was different
i wasn't THAT sick!
so at sixteen
still being a virgin forest
i decided
i must be a buddhist monk,
Then when people asked me
I TOLD THEM, i told them
"Not me, man, i don't belong to No-thing"

In the navy
a swabby once asked me,
if i wanted to go to the
temple with him,
i told him
"Not me, man, im the last
of the full blooded american indians."

it became confusing
so after a while
when people inquired
"Hey..ah..you arnt......are you?"
i answered
"with a name like levy,
what the hell do you think i am?"
A Ritz Cracker? A flying bathtub?
An arab? etc.

But now its getting pretty hip
to be a jew
and some of my best friend are
becoming converted to halavah,
even the crones who suddenly
became World War 2 catholics are
now praising bagels and lox
i still dont feel on ethnic things like

"Ok, we all niggers so lets hold hands."
&
"Ok, we're all wops so lets support the mafia,"
&
"Ok, we're all jews so lets weep on each others shoulders."
so now when people smile and say,
"Hey, you're one of us,"
i smile and say,
"Fuck you, man,
im still alive."

I'm not much of a poetry analyst, but this poem made me think. I don't know that it changed the way I think, but I did do a lot of thinking after I read it. The last two lines really stuck out: "Fuck you, man, / im still alive." It made me think, What are these labels? Should the way we describe ourselves also be how we define ourselves?

As a minority, I had always been told no to forget where I came from and that my race and my gender are a major part of who I am. And yet, in some ways, it seems that my race and gender have little effect on how I define myself. I am not stereotypical in any sense of the word. I do not like to follow mindless trends. For the most part, I take the consequences into consideration before I do something. These things have nothing to do with my gender or my ethnicity.

Also, as a living, breathing human being, I can easily reinvent myself. I can be jewish; I can be buddhist; I can be anything as long as I am alive. And really, that is all that matters. Labels are obsolete because people are dynamic. You can use them to describe but not to define. For me, this doesn't mean that labels are bad and we should never use them. It just means that people are always more than their labels and we should never let those labels restrain or determine our thoughts or our actions. Just because some people share a particular religion or ethnicity does not mean that they are compatible.

If you disagree with this poem or what I say about it, please remember that this is not an analysis. I just wanted to express the feelings that a particular poem stirs in me. I'd like to learn about how other people feel about this poem or other poems. Feel free to comment!