Joie de vivre

Do you lay awake at night

Wondering about your worth?

Do you question the reason of your being

Want your true calling to unearth?

Why don’t you take a step back

Think of all the times you bent

To help someone in need

Think of the helping hand you lent …

For moments don’t need memories

To be of any import

A stone doesn’t know when it’s layed

That it might turn into a fort …

What matters is what you do for love

For pleasure, for laughter, for life

And how you heal the sadness,

How you spar with your strife.

So, do you often lay awake at night

Wondering about your worth?

You brought a smile on your parents’ face

At the moment of your birth.

Dear Mother,

Love, the kind that doesn’t fade,

The kind that warms my heart,

On the coldest nights and darkest days,

The one greater than art!

I found that love in your arms,

Your lap, in your warm embrace…

Your soothing voice, your prideful eyes,

That gleam upon your face:

When you look at me, and through me

And forgive all the lies I tell,

Although they pinch you in your guts,

You keep your smile, while you go through hell.

Your fathomless kindness, I don’t deserve,

Yet you keep me afloat while you drown

In the sins of my own doings

With not even one little frown.

And now that I see, I try to feel,

All those years of sacrifice,

That you threw away on me

On someone so laden with vice.

They’re visible in your forehead, mother

From when you tried to correct me,

And your beautiful, tired eyes, mother

From always trying to perfect me.

You held me when I was shoved by all

You held me so tight

When I shrunk in sadness, you made me tall

You took my blackness and gave me light.

I feel this guilt, this heaviness

For I can never even start to repay

The one person I truly love

Much to my own dismay.

Dear mother, I will always know

The cost of love you paid.

It’s in my skin, in my bones

In every loop of my braid.

With love,

Your daughter.