Behind Glassy Eyes

What pain behind such glassy eyes that break at the break of dawn

That tell the tale of a soldier’s fight and sing the widow’s song.

What pain behind such glassy eyes that hide the deepest woes

Under the glare of a blinding sun so others never know.

What pain fills a quiet train where cries are silenced, too.

Where minds turned enemies fight the sane, of which so many lose.

What pain fills a quiet train, packed but filled with lone.

Where every soul craves others’ struggles in exchange of its own.

What pain is held in people so young that they’ve lived an entire life,

Yet always ignored and set aside because their years are much too slight.

What pain is held in people so young that it infects the days ahead,

When joy grows dull and laughter loses soul until the soul itself is dead.

Better

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
And you'd better know that just as people come in all shapes and sizes, as do hearts.

There are hearts that will pump the soul out of you just to pump the life back into itself.
And there are hearts that will pump out their blood just to nourish your soul.

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
And you'd better know that your pain is a flame that will persist until you can't breathe.

Don't ever let your flame burn you, my dear.
Let the flame warm your soul and brighten your darkness.

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
And you'd better know that the tears you cry are your weaknesses escaping you.

That the wounds of your heart are but battle scars that you should flaunt with pride.
They are proof that you've survived even the most painful of wars.

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
And you'd better know that you are the only one who can pick yourself up.

You, my dear, will never need anyone.
You are strong. You are independent. You came into this world alone and will leave alone.

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
But you can bring yourself ease of mind.

You just need to be satisfied with yourself.
You need to believe that you are the amazing person God made you to be.

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
And you'd better know that people will come and go.

Sometimes they will slowly vanish.
Sometimes they will slam a door and walk away leaving footsteps to a forbidden land.

You'd better know that life does not come easy, dear.
And you'd better know that some people are liars and selfish.

So when people leave you telling you you deserve better.
You'd better know to believe them.

Expectations

DISCLAIMER: The following poem is written for poetic purposes; it does not reflect the true feelings of its writer.

It is a general assumption that birds fly;
I am a bird with no wings.
I am overestimated for my capacity and my potential,
and yet it is capacity and potential that I lack.

What they say doesn't fly are pigs.
Yet, the connotation of a pig is condescending:
Useless.
Poor animals have done nothing but exist.

My inabilities dictate this:
I am a pig trapped in the body of a bird.
I am overestimated, expected to fly above all horizons.
"Nothing I can't do", but I of myself can do nothing.

I am a helium balloon buried underground.
I am a fish expected to climb a mountain.
I am a seed without soil and water.
I am a staircase leading nowhere.

A tree that bears no fruit.

An Unfortunate Parallel

I woke up this morning at 7 o’clock... Many children in the world did not wake up at all today

Instead, they fell asleep to lullabies of bombs and gunfire,

The harmonic cries of mothers watching their children drown in their own blood.

A lullaby without a beat; the beating had come earlier in the day.

                                                            

When I was 7 years old, I played with a baby doll and ran in the hallways from a friendly janitor.

Just an ocean away, 7 year olds run from the bloodthirsty soldiers,

Their dolls long since burnt in the flames with their blankets and pacifiers.

Not only robbed of their homes, but robbed of their innocence.

When I was 9 years old, I attained the lovely “gift of womanhood”; I was indifferent to it.

Thousands of young girls cry in despair on the sight of such a gift.

To them, this gift is a monthly curse, promising even more pain.

Clenching that, impossibly almost, extends past the clenching and churning of their empty stomachs.

At the age of 16, I graduated high school and thought that that made me a mature 16 year old.

I forget about the 16 year olds that work 11 hours a day to put food on the table.

I forget about the 16 year olds attempting to raise the 4 four children their parents had left behind.

I forget about the 16 year old beggars constantly being deprived of their birthright: happiness.

At the age of 26, I hope to have successfully graduated medical school, to be a wife.

Halfway across the globe, there are 26 year olds working day and night doing the dirty work,

For dehumanized masters set on dehumanizing their slaves, I mean servants.

And yet, these 26 year olds are considered lucky.

By the age of 30, I hope to kiss my child’s cheek before watching him run to his school’s gate.

Some 30 year olds are as helpless as bed-bound 97 year olds,

Helpless in privileging their children with the art of literacy,

Helpless in finding time amidst digging potting soil and digging graves to spend with their children before their energy drains.

By the age of 45, I pray to have a stable career and thriving health.

Sad as it is, and it really is, I have seen 45 year olds accumulating wealth, yes,

But from the change of people carrying bags upon bags of luxury at bazaars;

Wishing they had had their rightful luxury of an education.

By the age of 80, if I see it, I hope to be retired, sitting in the comfort of a cozy cottage like in the fairytales I would read to by grandchildren.

In countless places across the world, people are downright lucky to make it to eighty.

With filth and disease spreading like wildfire in the crowded rotting streets,

Their flames don’t only engulf the elderly, but extend to their young families, cutting their lives incredibly short.

After I die, I hope to leave a legacy, to be remembered.

Many people are not as hopeful as I; they have been forgotten long before death.

Eyesight

The ones I love are nearsighted.

They see everything that is now in the finest detail,

the outstretched arms and wrinkles of aging trees,

the individual tears of the clouds, the very structure of each snowflake.

But they too are frozen.

They are frozen in the present and they freeze it.

They tell me “live in the moment”

but all I can do is look with my farsighted eyes

to the avalanches and hurricanes that the grey clouds have been warning us of.

The massive tsunamis of pain and grief that will surely wash away every life in their paths, leaving us all as caskets; representing an existence but holding nothing but lifelessness.

They will never see it coming.

Pain will toss grenades into our grounds from a distance.

Revenge will catapult boulders onto our heads.

Anger will light a match that will set fire to our entire forest in seconds.

They are so good at ignoring the big problems and blaming “carpe diem”.

They are so good at creating false hopes by examining one teardrop and assuming its of joy,
Instead of studying the face to find the lack thereof.

I, on the other hand, am plagued with blindness.

Things I hold between my very fingertips are nonexistent.

I can see nothing valuable until it is far far away.

Perhaps that explains why I love those that are so hard to get.

I throw a rope to the opposite end of a wide trench,

where my vision begins to clarify,my thoughts begin to solidify into what I perceive to be love.

Yet when someone finally takes hold of my rope, I am so scared of losing them that I pull,

Sending them plummeting into a dark abyss of indifference.

My worst fear.

Where my farsightedness fails me.

The tsunamis have attacked me from behind, and I could not look right before me to the shadows of the dominant  wave creeping up above me.

It washes me away.

Leaves me like a casket.