For World Book Day (3 March), we also wanted to celebrate the love of writing! We’re really proud to share a series of four beautiful and thought-provoking poems, reflecting on important themes such as identity and self-exploration, by the talented AKS Jr., who attends our Creative Writing group.
A Picture of Me
There is a look in your eyes that tells me I am inside.
You look so young.
You left me behind.
Am I supposed to know, but I swear, I can’t remember.
Why is there that look in your eyes. What happened?
I know, you know, but you won’t say. Your lips are sealed
and you’re so far away.
I can’t help, I’m sorry. It’s all in the past. You’re stuck in a picture.
It can not last.
I did not abandon you. I will come back.
Please don’t stare.
It wasn’t your fault you were too young to known that
that staying at home would make you so old.
Why is there that look in your eyes
You seem so sad, are you afraid to cry?
I can’t believe they won’t open the door.
The party is inside and I am all alone in the corridor.
Where I am cold and it is dark.
Please open the door!
There is something in my room!
For God sake, why is there that look in your eyes?
I must go back to my room you see. And there is something
waiting inside for me.
Don’t go. Stare here with me.
You don’t understand I have to go back.
Alone? Yes
To my room? Yes
To stare at whatever it is that glares in the dark? Yes
It is Ok. I’m not afraid.
I may be young but I am also very brave, to look at the eyes
that stare in my eyes and stare at you,
out of this page.
I don’t remember why are you so afraid?
Don’t worry.
He’s gone away.
The Home Coming (Do I Know You?)
Take a seat by the fire.
You must be hungry.
Here is some bread and honey.
Tea?
Oh, yes please.
Dust from the road
My feet are so weary.
Here’s your tea. No sugar.
That’s right.
Do I know you?
That last mile was a killer.
I didn’t think I was going to make it.
There were lots of times I wanted to give-up.
But something would not let me.
Do I know you?
There’s a hot bath running upstairs.
Clean towels and soap.
When you come down your supper will be on the table.
Your favourite.
Thanks.
I don’t feel like I’ve slept in years.
Rest.
You’ll start to feel better soon.
I feel better already.
I didn’t recognize you at first.
But then I realized your are not the same person that left.
You’ve come along way my friend.
Welcome home.
God Knows the Boy
Ben’s earliest memory is one of being 5 years old.
It’s playtime. On the farside of the school playground
is a wooden shed. He squats in the corner where he
can see his friends and where he can watch them play.
His friends invite him to join-in, but he declines.
He feels comfortable squatting in the corner and
defecating in his pants. He teases the motion until
he can no longer resist the compulsion. The experience is
not unpleasant. That afternoon the boy is sent home, his
pants wrapped in newspaper, like fish and chips.
Today, a man, Ben finds it difficult to make sense of
the memory. He knows the memory is important, because
it is one of a kind, but does not know how.
The boy reminds the man of a later memory.
Ben is 11years old. Night after night, he
comforts himself and wipes his comfort from his hand
onto his bedroom wall. No-one appears to notice
the lonely brown stain on the drab wallpaper.
And the Black Knight that hangs from his curtain
cannot protect him from the fear that knocks
on his door.
And Ben wonders, “when will it all end?”
I am…
I say to myself;
I am not Alexander Pope
I am not William Shakespeare
I am not Carl Jung
I am not Adam Curtis
I am not Muhammed Ali
I am not D’Artagnan
I am not Achilles
I am not the Hunchback of Notre-Dame
I am not Tarzan
I am not Billy the Kind
I am not the 7th Cavalry
I am not Gordon Ramsey
I am not Howard Hughes
I am not Mahatma Ghandi
I am not John F. Kennedy
I am not Sir Isaac Newton
I am not Kenneth Williams
I am not Ronnie Kray
I am not John Castro
I am not Tommie Smith
I am not Marilyn Monroe
I am not Captain Blood
I am not Atticus Finch
I am not a John Doe
I am not a comedian
I am not an entertainer
I am not my mum
I am not my dad
I am not poor
I am not rich
I am not stupid
I am not English
I am not a Londoner
I am not white
I am not brown
I am not a nurse
I am not a therapist
I am not a junkie
I am not good with boundaries
I am not here to please
I am not who I think I am
And
I am not you.
I am…
I am beginning to love who “I am…” by learning who
I am not. And that is a start for me.
Want to write for us?
If you’d like to write a blog or create a video blog for us, a poem, a song or a piece of art, you don’t have to be an expert at it, we can coach you through it or you’re welcome to submit your own, whether it was created in private or at one of the activities we run! Just get in touch with Connie, our Communications Lead, at connie@maryfrancestrust.org.uk
