Proper Anonymity Poem by RIC BASTASA

at the age of fifty
i should have been somebody else
someone great
greater than the sun
famous, rich and
powerful


somebody
bigger than a rock boulder
beside an old mountain
for which travelers look at me
as a great story that they
can always tell to their
children and grandchildren
on the night times of
their lifetime

i could have been a strong river
wider than a lake
bringing all sand and silt and
storing them all
in my own huge basin
where all tourist come and
praise and then plunge themselves
for the unforgettable swim
of their lives
in the watery belly of
my greatness

but at the age of fifty
(just like everyone else
who drown themselves in the alcoholic
contents of their bottles
and who smoke their cigarettes
endlessly like a chimney
in winter)
i am still a nobody
my name is very ordinary
and people who pass by
do not even give a glimpse
as though i am, at least,
a human being
with the face like the moon
boosted by
a crown of stars

i dream,
i dream big, much bigger than your dreams
when i was young
but all my dreams have become wasted
dumped and burned and
in-order to live in peace
i have forgotten all of them
buried them alive
screams drowned six feet below
the ground

this is existence now
it is not i who is the center of this universe
it is the sun or
someone else who still believes that he is the sun
or can be
with all possibilities statistics-wise
the only sun
surrounded by all the planets
and accommodated by
the vast expanse
of space

my mother says i have become a mature man
by this she means
i have accepted what i am and where my place is

i guess we all have the same story
we are finally here
in the greatness and peace of
our own anonymity

in the ordinariness of routine
waiting for our own
chosen (hopefully) happy ending