Seeking lightness we embrace a new weight
by Aline Rahbany
We all have a baggage to carry
A heavy, invisible baggage
Stuck to our skin
Stacked on our shoulders
Containing all the hard time
We passed through during the day
Our low moments and disappointments
Our worries and distress
We all have our loads and burdens
The dark thoughts that haunt our minds
The obstacles that keep staking before us
In moments we can’t help but renounce
But it all comes down to a single instant
To a single person
That friend you haven’t seen in ages
That relative you find nothing in common with
That lover whom you think is too preoccupied
Fetching his own way through his own mind load
It all comes down to that single moment
You meet that person
And lay down your baggage on their shoulders
Whether through a shocking statement
A shout, a sigh or a tear …
And then you turn your back to each other
And each of you, heavy with a new burden now
The burden of the other
Goes on to sail again
In the profound ocean of everyday life
Where each day brings its new weight
* * *
© 2010 by Aline Rahbany, all rights reserved
included in the Crisis Chronicles Online Library with the poet’s permission
She writes:
I dream. I dream when people are not watching. My dreams exist some place in the air – written in a dashing way. All I do is grab the air with my hands, wash my face with it, let it penetrate my body straight into my soul; only to come out in the form of words. A dreamer who puts her imaginings in words and plays on filtering them as an attempt to create her own little world. I only started translating my thoughts into writing recently. Upon taking writing as a way to escape from reality, I never knew I would go this far. My writings are pure thoughts and “raw emotions” mainly exploring different aspects of the human being. When I am not dreaming, I am another 24 year old distorted person living in Lebanon and indulging in – down to earth – humanitarian field of work for the past two years. I have been published in Shoots & Vines, Opium Poetry 2.0, Black-Listed Magazine, Eviscerator Heaven and soon in Calliope Nerve.