I also wrote this poem on Scribophile, but since I may have to remove it in the future, here’s my poem posted here for posterity:
*Prologue*
A mustachioed man in a three-piece suit kneels on the beach, the heat of indignant desperation burning his face.
He cries out to the heavens:
“Pītahshri*!
Pītahshri*!
I know you can hear me!
Who am I,
what am I,
if not a grain of sand?”
*an honorific title in Hindi meaning “father.”
Title: How it’s Going
Father!
WHO AM I?!
And why have I been left behind?
It’s like every time
I’ve won at life
means nothing to the world this time,
WHO AM I?!
And why did I decide to lie?
I swore an oath upon my name
that I’d be better and not the same.
To work towards the wealth and fame
you said I’d earn in your father’s name.
WHO AM I?!
And how can I be allowed to cry?
My tears I shed but in my sleep
When you and I once more do meet.
Many things you share and speak
And give to me the signs to seek.
WHO AM I?
And what use have I of any signs?
Your signs they speak on in my mind
That I try to find them in time
but I fear that they’ve left me behind.
WHO AM I?
And how dared I once decide to lie?
I swore my oath on pain of death,
the eagerness once in my chest
has long since left
and now of all but death I am bereft.
WHO AM I?
But why do you say to stay true?
You see me beaten in the sand,
no master of music nor of land,
but in my dreams you hold my hand
and bid me wait for something grand.
WHO AM I?
To judge your words to be untrue?
It was you who spoke into the sky
your son’s name would reach heavens high.
WHO AM I?
and why do I deserve to cry?
And allow me to simply be
a man whose pain will pass by me.
WHO AM I?
And why do I not want to die?
Who I am won’t let me lie
Won’t let me die,
won’t be left behind.
WHO AM I?
And if I do not want to die,
why do these visions of death
bring youth back to my chest?
WHO AM I?
To continue on as I’ve been beat?
If I die then once more we’ll meet
and gladly I’ll prostrate before your feet.
WHO AM I?
To dare not to die?
WHAT IS THIS?
The eagerness it does not die.
Then hear me well,
I will not die,
I will work as such under the sky
that I rush out from behind the signs.
I did not lie.
I will not lie.
You did not lie,
you could not lie!
Who am I?
The one who once swore is I,
the one who did not lie is I,
the one who embraces death is I,
the one who struggles for you is I.
I am I.
And you are why am I.
The Wubba Experience 