Thread: "Cloudy Day"
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Old 12-31-2014, 09:36 AM
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Florence
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Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Midwest, USA
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"Cloudy Day"

Feeling romantic, reading some poetry. I came across this lovely poet, who was an addict from a family of addicts, then spent some time in prison, educated himself, and eventually became a published author and professor. I adore this poem, especially the last stanza. I thought some of us would appreciate the sentiment.

Sometimes we are hit with burdens so big and hard we can't understand them, but we make it through and even find a way to feel grateful for having experienced the hardship, and have recognized our incredible luck and humility in the face of all that hardship.

My terrible, demoralizing alcoholic marriage, my numb divorce, the lack of support from my family and some friends, realizing my biggest fear of becoming a single parent again, realizing I was culpable for my life's crappy trajectory, these were all incredible emotional hardships to me, and required a complete retooling of my belief system and a new understanding about me and how to live. Yet I'm so happy I experienced this because I feel complete and free today in ways I couldn't have appreciated or recognized before.

Anyway, happy new years, guys. It's the season for making big changes.



Cloudy Day
BY JIMMY SANTIAGO BACA
It is windy today. A wall of wind crashes against,
windows clunk against, iron frames
as wind swings past broken glass
and seethes, like a frightened cat
in empty spaces of the cellblock.

In the exercise yard
we sat huddled in our prison jackets,
on our haunches against the fence,
and the wind carried our words
over the fences,
while the vigilant guard on the tower
held his cap at the sudden gust.

I could see the main tower from where I sat,
and the wind in my face
gave me the feeling I could grasp
the tower like a cornstalk,
and snap it from its roots of rock.

The wind plays it like a flute,
this hollow shoot of rock.
The brim girded with barbwire
with a guard sitting there also,
listening intently to the sounds
as clouds cover the sun.

I thought of the day I was coming to prison,
in the back seat of a police car,
hands and ankles chained, the policeman pointed,
“See that big water tank? The big
silver one out there, sticking up?
That’s the prison.”

And here I am, I cannot believe it.
Sometimes it is such a dream, a dream,
where I stand up in the face of the wind,
like now, it blows at my jacket,
and my eyelids flick a little bit,
while I stare disbelieving. . . .

The third day of spring,
and four years later, I can tell you,
how a man can endure, how a man
can become so cruel, how he can die
or become so cold. I can tell you this,
I have seen it every day, every day,
and still I am strong enough to love you,
love myself and feel good;
even as the earth shakes and trembles,
and I have not a thing to my name,
I feel as if I have everything, everything.
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