There are stories of what happens 

to immigrants who move west. 

How people come to America 

and lose their heritage.

How families are corrupted 

into abandoning their culture. 

For my mother, Japan is a place of comfort. 

A comfort not always found in the United States. 

Not the warm aromas or endless chatter, 

but the language and customs–a sense of familiarity; the lack of otherization.

Coming to a foreign land stripped away these comforts,

creating a muffled yearning for home.

Little did she know that America would be the safe haven

where the split between two lands became a bridge between two countries.