WonL
The random thoughts of an architect-turned- lawyer from the deep south living in Washington, DC...
Thursday, February 02, 2006
The Metamorphosis of Me
In honor of Blogger Poetry Day, I have done some digging and a bit of soul-searching. When I was a child, I wrote poetry to express myself. Granted, they were Shel-Silverstein-style poems, but to a kid, they were masterpieces. I rarely showed my poems to people because they were private (and, um, not very good). Thankfully, my parents always told me to keep some sort of compilation so I could look back one day. I have had occassion to dig them out and read them a few times over the years and it really is quite humorous to me. Most of my poems are about the "love of my life" that week, but I also wrote about best friends, suicide (not mine), friends moving away, and just plain growing up. I would have to say the most telling ones are those about my parents. It is fascinating to me how the same two people can be viewed through different lenses...that of age.I wrote this about ma and pa in my "woe is me" pre-teen years:
Monsters Beyond My Door
They think just because we came from dust
That they can treat me like dirt.
They never seem to care
How much they make me hurt.
I hate them for the way they treat me.
I hate them for not giving a damn.
They don't appreciate me for me,
I am sorry if that is the way I am.
No one's home when I feel bad,
When I need someone to cry to.
So when I hear the words "I'm sorry"
It's not like it's anything new.
They pick and choose my friends
And keep me inside this fence.
If you are wondering who these awful people are,
They call themselves my parents.
They want me to pretend we're one big happy family,
When they can't even stand each other.
It's really hard when your own flesh and blood
Doesn't want to be your brother.
And I wrote this one after having grown to appreciate my family a bit:
Things I Thank My Parents For:
The bottle when I was just a baby
The food when I could only cry
The blankets when I was chilly
And when I was ill, staying by my side
At Christmas, letting me help decorate the tree
And praying before bedtime each night
For yelling at my brothers and me
When it seemed like all we did was fight
The perm I was given back in fourth grade
The slumber parties over the years
The in-style clothing I had to have
The tissues when my eyes filled with tears
For making me work for my own money
For not taking pictures on my first date
The curfews that they set for me
For pretending to sleep when I came in late
For praising all my good grades
And grounding me for the bad
For teaching me right from wrong
And always to appreciate what I had
More than that, I thank my parents
For unconditionally loving me
For letting me make my own mistakes
Then being there to help me see
For sticking together through troubled times
Promising to love me to the end
But most of all, Mom and Dad
Thank you for being my best friends.
I guess that no matter how often I say I don't want to grow up, there are some things I am really grateful I grew out of:-)