When I Was Young
a poem
I.
When I was young, I used to listen to the drums
And wonder at why most people are simply left with the crumbs
Then I grew up and saw Mama cry night and night into a pot
And told myself that I’d work hard to block her tears with everything that could be bought
I’d grow up and be rich
And we’d forget about the old times with the turn of a switch
I’d paint over the callouses on her hands and erase the worry lines by her eyes
I thought poverty was something you could exorcize
But like putting lipstick over dry, flaky, chapped lips
Hardship is not something that you can easily eclipse
It would take more than a brand new car to drive my mother from the misery that had stitched itself far into her organs and her veins
II.
When I was young, I was cheated by a rose
It was my first memory of feeling weary and indisposed
In spite of the sandpaper on which I’d been spread
With child-like naivete I guess I’d assumed that everyone gave thanks to their daily bread
Speak, see, and hear no evil
When cheated, I was in an upheaval
Embraced by a dust cloud and chugging diesel to mar my insides
People were mean and would easily bulldoze you like a riptide
People could make you feel like dirt
Apparently there were no limits to how much you could get hurt
III.
But that was not who I was
Disenchantment was not a sufficient cause
For shedding the kindly disposition I’d been earlier taught
I was kind, and good, and startled by my dark thoughts
I needed to shut myself off to cope
And wash away the negativity with soap
My heart entered an unholy union with hope
Afraid to make their relationship official in case what they had was hanging by a flimsy rope
Their acts of copulation must have been loud
Because my father, in that quiet lacerating manner of his, commented and I was cowed
He said to me, gruff, but with some tenderness underneath the muff:
‘Son, there are some things not up for show
And more yet that you cannot know’
His branch-like fingers embedded into my shoulder for support
I, with nothing worthwhile or pithy to report,
Swallowed silence even though it had been my last resort
When your father tells you that the trees, earth, and skies are mute
That little in life is resolute
That suffering rides wild with a cap
And that no bullets, arrows, or words can help you to find your way back on the map
It’s enough to dilute your desire to try
IV.
With no dispute
I gave up and my pain was acute
I didn’t have it in me anyways
I nailed my body to the hardest gravel and laid in preparation
I’d been marked for slaughter from birth, that’s what my father said
I couldn’t stop my mother’s tears
The buckets is which she bled would triple over the years
My father would continue to hold onto me with desperation and babble
Afraid that too much hope would eventually turn me into a jackal
Once I realized that, as with the rose, life deals you with multiple lows
And for some, they overcome
As for others, they succumb
My father taught me that we were the type of people who were safer trying nothing and accepting what we had
That living with low expectations wasn’t so bad
You knew where you stood
And that was always good
But thinking and telling my mother we could do better
Would only upset her
And I didn’t want that, did I?
Father asked
Meekly, I said no and crawled into a happier moment from my past
V.
That was when I was young
Now that I’m older
I’ve gotten a little bolder
When I’m gray
I have much to say
When I set my true self loose
There’s no room for abuse
I gurgle my frustration
Mask my hesitation
Clipped though my hands may be
Underrated though my feet may seem
They have power enough to glean that
It is not up to me to race to the finishing line when the whistle is blown
The wind shall pick up my self-inflicted spite
My insides shall churn to instill in me some might
And I shall soar and cross the finishing line when the time pleases
Not a second before
Not a second too late
VI.
When I was young, I didn’t know that being happy was a choice
And that if you tried hard, you could block out the noise
Now that I’m older, I rinse the fune-real smog from my coat,
Hang it by a chair and raise my head to a tilt, light in one eye and darkness out the other
How I hate a life that goes on repeat
To live is to live and to learn along the way
So that some day, you can love yourself a little bit more
Because you’ve learnt to be a little more
Than what you were yesterday
It’s incremental
It’s steep
It’s hard
And you’re constantly on guard as you wait for a green card to tell you that you’re cured, you’ve matured, and you’ve magically secured a place in the hall of those who made it to the other side of the hell on Earth
That’s nonsense and you know it
Life is improbable
And unsolvable
But we must live it as if all’s probable and solvable
It’s in hope and faith that our humanity lies
