So it's been awhile, yeah? Looks like life has done its thing again and gotten in the way of my free time to do the things I really love doing. Like blogging to you lovely people. But April is National Poetry Month and I've been taking a poetry class in school this semester, and I'm so excited about what I've been learning in how to read and write poetry and what it's all about and why it is so important to humans. As my professor always says, "poetry can woo people and save our souls." So with only a few more weeks left in my second year of college (whoa I'm halfway to graduation...how is this even possible?!), and a little more appreciation for the art of line-breaking, I've decided to honor National Poetry Month by sharing a little bit of what I've been doing and what I've learned.
Reaching Eventually
No one ever asks
if you want to be born.
You are simply squeezed
into existence
with the expectation of Eventually
becoming wealthy and worthwhile
when maybe all you wanted to be
was nothing at all.
As you toddle through time
learning that caterpillars are magic
and the neighbor's cat
actually wants to eat you
you are too busy to notice the day
when boys begin bribing you
for sweeter things
than the fruit roll-ups in your Lunchable.
Then suddenly you have deadlines
and a boss that needs
EverythingRightNow.
Your life is super glued
to numbers and hands that draw circles
as tired as the ones growing beneath your eyes
and you miss the dusky evenings
when the only clock you knew how to read
was the one in your grumbly tummy.
And when the days you thought were safe
in your back pocket
begin to run out
you realize that the line
between Progress and Regress
has always been inked
in invisible pen.
And the Eventually
you were expected to reach
was always just a step ahead of you
because you were too busy
spending life either
believing that caterpillars really are magic
or trying to figure out why they're not.
© Jessica-Edwards-Smith 2013
