Okita uses the tomato, a food native to the Americas, to highlight the speaker’s American identity, while Cisneros uses the English language to give her characters an American identity. The writers use bleak imagery to convey the sense of isolation they feel from their respective cultures. The speaker of Okita’s poem feels a sense of loss at the prospect of being moved from her home, while the speaker of Cisneros’s short story longs to leave her current location and return to America. The American identity of both speakers is highly questionable, as they frequently refer to their foreign identities.
