Making A Fist Poem by Naomi Shihab Nye
Making A Fist
We forget that we are all dead men conversing wtih dead men.
—Jorge Luis Borges
For the first time, on the road north of Tampico,
I felt the life sliding out of me,
a drum in the desert, harder and harder to hear.
I was seven, I lay in the car
watching palm trees swirl a sickening pattern past the glass.
My stomach was a melon split wide inside my skin.
'How do you know if you are going to die?'
I begged my mother.
We had been traveling for days.
With strange confidence she answered,
'When you can no longer make a fist.'
Years later I smile to think of that journey,
the borders we must cross separately,
stamped with our unanswerable woes.
I who did not die, who am still living,
still lying in the backseat behind all my questions,
clenching and opening one small hand.
Very nice! A mother's simple loving conversation can stay with a child for ever.
Beautiful. The doctrine to fix the fist of existence. It's a feast of positive thought.........................................................Pranab k c
I who did not die, who am still living, still lying in the backseat behind all my questions....I hold this part of this poem in high regard.
Years later I smile to think of that journey, the borders we must cross separately, stamped with our unanswerable woes.
A very touching poem indeed. The road of life often offers bumpy ride and if we can negotiate it, well done!
...........excellent poem....I could never ride in the back seat again ★
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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4/27/2024 4:48:01 AM # 1.0.0.1119
very...nice......really nice...i wish naomi didnt use religions in it tho -_-