When we were young and sat at the storyteller’s feet,
wrinkled, sage, his words were already in our ears, and like
a magician, he pulled them out to show us how they gleamed.
He told of a people who came untethered
from the ancient tree that grew them,
rolling like severed fruit without root across land and seas.
Boldly, lost seedlings took hold, growing strong in inhospitable soil,
until mahogany-eyed children perched on newly grown branches,
watching urban jungles devour the sons of kings.
And dreams were shattered, pieces of fate lay scattered
among denuded bones and mountains of untold stories,
praying to be sung, but left to rot in merciless sun,
as the ties that bound the people came undone.
Their wounds never healed from the bloodlines long severed,
and monstrous wrongs hid in shallow graves.
And the others were entertained by the frantic formations of a people divided,
colonized, proselytized, and so very tired of waiting to be saved
by a hero that never came. There was complicated shame.
They gave up hoping, and instead of changing, invested in coping,
and finding new villains to blame. They got so fat from being fed up,
they could no longer stand up.
Until they decided to go back to the beginning,
to the original meaning, and start a new translation of their history.
To stop parsing pebbles, waiting for reparations,
and recognize they were already the foundation stones for a nation.
Foes strained to hear each other over the bellowing sounds
of their respective pain, and the people reached on tiptoes
to peer over the battlements of righteousness
to realize their fight was not to avenge the past,
but to conquer the future, and travel forward leaving no one behind.
The formidable struggle would be to survive, build lives,
see beyond divides in tribes and religions, release hearts
from fearful prisons, unite factions in forceful peace,
and unleash potential in movement of thundering minds and feet.
At the end of the story, the people pressed each other to remember
they were one, and they were free.
Gold trophy winner
Adding your comment:
You are very, very kind.
Write on, love.
