Where do you come from? Where are you headed? How did you get here?
Do you have any memories at all? Do you remember being in a pink bundle, or maybe blue? Do you recall strong arms holding you, loving you, caring for you? Do you remember the scent of your mother's favorite shampoo, the way her hair smelled when she kissed you good night? Do you remember her soft voice as she sang to you a lullaby, and rocked you gently to sleep?
Can you taste the cherry flavored lolly pop that you sucked, while riding your bike? Can you still see the shiny red paint of your first one, with training wheels? Does it still hurt where you fell, and skinned your knee time and time again?
If you close your eyes, do you still see your favorite book in front of you? Can you recite it word for word, as you did back then? Do you still laugh, when you remember the words to your favorite TV show? And when you see snow flakes, do you still smile, and recall the snowmen you used to build, and the snow ball fights you had?
Do you remember squabbling with siblings, fighting over toys? Can you feel the soft fleece of your favorite blanky, which you dragged with you everywhere? Does your belly still ache from all the cookies you ate, which Mama warned you about? Can you still hear her voice echoing, as she called you in for supper, after a long day playing outside?
Or have you since forgotten it all. Has the cold become too bitter, and the heat, unbearable, that you forget from where you came. Do you wake up every day, in this hell hole, and feel like you just appeared there? With no past at all? Are your memories long gone, replaced with bitter ones of your new reality? Or worse, do you have no memories at all?
Were you born here? Did you never even get a chance? Did your belly never know fullness? Were your lips never touched by a smile, and your heart, never lifted in happiness? Did you never know the feel of a loving embrace? Did you ever sleep in one place for more than a night at a time? When you feel the cold snow flakes on your skin, does it only bring to mind winter, cold, and the need to seek cover? When you walk barefoot in the summer grass, does it remind you that you have no shoes?
Do you have any happy memories at all?
Where did you come from? Where are you headed? How did you get here? Do you even know the answers?
Very poetic an well written! It sounds like one of those "going out into the world" sort of things with the whole leaving behind and forgetting your childhood memories theme. I like this one a lot.
ReplyDeletethank you! i like it too!
ReplyDeletei actually had in mind homeless people when i wrote it, but u can interpret it however u like
oh, oh yes I see it now from that angle. lol I was way off but it's even better reading it from your perspective
ReplyDeletevery poetic. I have plenty of happy childhood memories, but I think many of them are not authentic memories and I only remember them because my parents retold the story and it became a second hand memory.
ReplyDeletea) u are not homeless. but i guess that goes to show that everyone has some sort of memory.
ReplyDeletevery true. i remember things, then discuss it with my mother to be told its not accurate and could never have happened.
thanks. i actually like this post.
this brings tears to my eyes
ReplyDelete1, People don't usually realize that it's a slow process--these folk don't turn homeless, penniless, and fresh-scentedless overnight. Just saying.
ReplyDelete2, How many people of the age you are writing (homeful ppl) remember/muse/cherish these memories? Would it not be more accurate to reference later points in life?
3, If I had written this piece, my second comment here would probably annoy me cuz I wouldn't have written it as a scientifically researched paper--rather, as a sudden expression after seeing one homeless too many.
4, Cheers. No, not the ones you sit on.
sabra- no, thats the whole point. childhood memories are the first ones, and the most important for life. if you will remember anything at all, it most probably would be from chilhood. plus, trying to bring out the point that trhey may actually have some good memories to remember, you would have to go all the way back to childhood, rather than more recent.
ReplyDeletei see your point, but disagree.
thanks chanala. I hope in a good way!
Oddly, I have a good memory of my childhood but the more recent years are a bit hazy.
ReplyDeleteproven.
ReplyDeletethe strongest memories are always the ones that stick with u from childhood, and may be subconscious, sometimes u dont even know u remember it until it pops up, or something reminds u abt it.