During 楼凤天堂 Poetry Month, we will be posting poems that originally ran in one of the . This poem “” by Emilie Lygren聽comes from :
For the students
Sometimes we sit in circles with these questions-
What are you afraid of?
Who are your heroes and why?
What do you do in your free time that really makes you free?
My students answer-
I have no free time. It is all full of work, then I take care of my little sister.
My hero is my brother because when there are guns he pushes me to the ground.
Sometimes I am afraid my mother will work so hard she will die.
They are ten, maybe eleven.
I cannot follow them home
and ask their fathers
to stop leaving,
take their books and burdens
for an hour a day
so they can go be children again.
I can listen when they speak.
I can turn their heads towards the sunrise,
then to the dragonflies hatching by the creek.
I can hold their packs while they run shouting
towards an ocean they have never seen.
I can dump the watering can on their heads
on the hottest day of the year.
I can honor their courage, and their joy.
I cannot change the world they are living into,
but I can change the world they live in
for the tremor of a moment,
the same way we all can for each other with a
small smile or knowing sigh
and the fierce act of living in the world with an
open heart.
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