Balancing the words of our mothers and the pull of our history.
Contest entry |
Without Flinching Stretching my toes in the damp blanket of leaves, I hear the voice in my head "You’ll track mud on the carpet, or come down with a cold." Then I hear that other voice. The whisper of my heart saying "this is the only way to feel her heartbeat, to really know your mother." One voice pulls, the other listens, silently, for it knows I will return, someday, and my feet will know the Earth again. My ears will grow deaf to the voice of hesitance and fear and my body will become immune to the cries of loneliness from human islands, castles with stone walls, who dig their own motes. Then, flinching with pain, fill these motes with their own tears. Someday, I will walk through the forest without flinching with pain from rocks and acorns beneath soft skin, unaccustomed to life without insulation. Until then, I will return to this forest, stretch my feet beneath the damp, fallen leaves, dig my toes into the cold earth. Through a wireless world, beyond the dreams of my people, I will learn to make footprints through paths less traveled, without flinching. SWPoet 11/10/09 |