Not everyone
is meant to be more
than ordinary, you say.
You told me this before,
and I dismissed you
because you might have been content
with that way of thinking,
but you were always meant to be.
We sit there, sipping
on something hot,
warding off the chill of
a newly departed season,
and I taste dead leaves.
These words, I think to myself,
and all others like them,
should be forgotten
before the last one unfolds,
because they lack conviction
and reek of resignation.
Hey you,
I say while hot needles
bleed down my throat
draining into a pool of cool,
I carry my world
in a sack over my shoulder,
believing that the carefully stitched fabric,
portends the greatness within.
It’s no burden to the likes of me,
while the modest sack you carry
looks to be much lighter than mine.
I say this with some bemused disdain
and pleased with my play,
I take another sip.
You smile,
and look at me
with what could only be
deprecating derision.
Look, you say,
rolling your eyes as one does,
my sack is certainly lighter,
and far more plain,
but I’m not struggling to carry it
and can walk fairly straight,
scarcely aware that I wear it.
How do you bear the load in yours?
I sheepishly look away,
unable to deny that I am
slump-shouldered from the weight
of a dazzle-bag of ordinary,
and shivering madly as
some kind of winter
crawls over my skin.
Tara- Very nicely done, reminds me a bit of Billy Collins, reads almost like a conversation which makes it real and not 'stilted.' You certainly have a way of plumbing the depths of the mind/ senses!
As a fellow Canadian, I was hoping to read something about the cold of the north where I come from. Above Sudbury. Miss it sometimes. Adeline
Wow, you do have a thorough way of describing life. And I feel that you want to be understood, not just using vague adjectives to sound verbose. Again I truly enjoyed this. Adeline
In the middle of the poem, the speaker is still operating under self-delusion, and says the bag is not burden because it's what they want to believe. At the end, they have begun to acknowledge that the weight of self-expectation and what they consider to be unfulfillment, is more than they were first willing to admit.
This is honest, told again in an original voice that puts me right over your shoulder. (Yet ANOTHER question: in the middle of the poem, you say your 'bag' is no burden. At the end, you acknowledge that it definitely IS. Was the first meant as merely a rhetorical flourish?)
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
Truly enjoyed this read, very nicly done....