We’re silly fools
with our petty fights
We have petty dreams
and sleepless nights
We lie awake
and think up things
New lives and loves
of queens and kings
We dream and wish
of things above
And get lost in
what never was
The years, they pass
the time grows thin
Our lives have flown
and we don’t know when
We spent true time
thinking up a throne:
That our own has fallen?
how we should have known
The plan so far
is to not grow up
But to grow grey
wrinkled and old
The difference
between the two
Is there
But you must find it
for yourself
His name is Pee Sai.
He is 23-years-old.
He is my friend.
Pee Sai speaks very little English, and I speak absolutely no Burmese, but the language barrier is not detrimental towards our friendship. I don’t need to speak his language to know that Pee Sai is hilarious, kind, and worrysome. He does not need to speak my language to know how well we get along.
When I first met Pee Sai, I had just crossed the Burmese-Thai border after sitting between the two countries in horrendous heat for an hour. I was sweaty, irritated, and was suffering from one of my headaches; he was shy, not speaking to anyone as we found our way to the bus that would take us throughout Burma.
I officially met Pee Sai outside of a school in the Burmese mountains. I was asked to grab my ukulele from the bus so our group could sing a song for the schoolchildren, and Pee Sai was asked to escort me.
“Hello, I am Pee Sai, what is your name?”
“Hi, I’m Aria!”
When I tried to converse further, I realized how those few words were some of the only English words Pee Sai knew. After we discovered this hurdle, we communicated through outrageous gestures, silly faces, and universal sounds of approval, disapproval, annoyance, and happiness.
Pee Sai would seem to be, to most of anyone, a shy but friendly face; a man who has lived a relatively easy life and recognizes that.
Pee Sai has not lived such a life.Read More »
If all you need is love
Then what is oxygen
And air?
What is food
And shelter
And safety?
What is security
And education
And support?
You do not need love
But crave it
And want it
But maybe that’s what necessity is.
The sound is deep.
It resonates throughout the room,
The chamber of my heart,
And the corners of my fingers.
The sound is gorgeous.
Irresistible.
It sends shivers down my spine,
Raises my skin,
Flutters my heart.
How I long for it to be closer.
Not across a world
Or a room
But behind me.
Heat seeping to my shirt,
A breath behind my ear,
A whisper.
A whisper of anything:
Everything.
Just to hear that deep sound.
Just to send shiver to my spine,
Send bumps to my skin,
Send flutters to my heart,
Send a longing directly through me.
Your sound is deep.
It resonates throughout the room,
And throughout the chamber of my heart.
It must be so boring!
So dull. So bleak.
To live in a mind
No more than obsolete.
Does it drive you mad?
No madder than me.
To breathe in their air,
But see more than they see?
I thought you were different:
Extraordinary! Unique!
But you’re just like them:
Boring, labeled, not me.
So take a leap of faith
Off a hospital roof!
With you still alive,
They’ll not yet know truth.
You fraud! You fake!
You waste of a genius!
They’ll never understand
While drowning under brilliance.
So jump! Leap!
Wait! Here! I’ll go first.
Because, as falls go,
Reichenbach is worst.
If I were brave,
I would straddle the tallest cliff-side,
Waver from low to high pride,
And fall just for the view.
If I were brave,
I would light myself on fire,
Let the flames crawl higher and higher,
Until the heat felt like you.
And if I were a lion
Not a mouse, instead,
I would survive every evening
And not cower in my head.
If I kept my eyes open,
With no fumble or flinch,
I would see every moment
Of I life that I miss.
If I were brave…
If I were brave…
If I were brave…
But I’m not.
So I will cower!
And cringe!
And flee from every shadow!
I will cry out!
And miss
The life that others borrow.
Because I am not brave.
I hide from every cliff.
But what if I were brave?
What if, what if, what if.
