A Happy Poem
Mustajab Farrukh
I’ve decided this is going to be a happy poem
No more talk of this grief that makes my bones too heavy to move
This weariness of the soul that has me disassociating in the middle of a conversation with my
mother
And this terrible, terrible pain somewhere (everywhere, really) in my body that I can’t talk to
anyone about because Mustajab, you really need to stop imagining there’s something wrong with
you.
I’ve decided this is going to be a happy poem,
So I can’t talk of how it took only about 45 visits to the doctor and a several 100 scans for him to
say
There’s a cyst burgeoning inside of you, we’re going to have to cut it out
There’s a cyst, so you’re going to be going through pain for a while
There’s a cyst, but it’ll all be alright, just painful.
I’ve decided this is going to be a happy poem,
Of course then, I’m not going to mention what he said next, that doctor
He said sometimes
Sometimes the things in our head hurt so much that when left unexpressed and unattended to,
they begin to physically manifest themselves
(the heartburn, the stomachaches,
the nausea, the migraines,
the chest pains, the-)
That’s why you’ve been hurting, there’s nothing wrong with you really
Just your head.
Since this is going to be a happy poem,
I guess I can’t mention the look in my mother’s eyes as I lay in the suffocating white of a
hospital bed
Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t do this to yourself.
I gave you
Everything.
You did give me everything mother,
So I don’t know why despite the painkillers surging through my bloodstream
I still ached.
I know that this is supposed to be a happy poem,
And so I promise I won’t tell you that my brain has been conditioned into thinking that respite is
more fleeting and more temporary than the flicker of the dying sun on the ocean that weeps for
the shore,
And the only times I’ve felt at home in this body of mine have been-
(I don’t know, when?)
I won’t tell you that sometimes even when I’m a thousand miles away from home,
I still see the brown of my mother’s eyes reflecting my pain, her hand on my wrist that a needle
too many has suckled on
And she tells me not to do this to myself.
Perhaps the next poem will be happier.
No more talk of this grief that makes my bones too heavy to move
This weariness of the soul that has me disassociating in the middle of a conversation with my
mother
And this terrible, terrible pain somewhere (everywhere, really) in my body that I can’t talk to
anyone about because Mustajab, you really need to stop imagining there’s something wrong with
you.
I’ve decided this is going to be a happy poem,
So I can’t talk of how it took only about 45 visits to the doctor and a several 100 scans for him to
say
There’s a cyst burgeoning inside of you, we’re going to have to cut it out
There’s a cyst, so you’re going to be going through pain for a while
There’s a cyst, but it’ll all be alright, just painful.
I’ve decided this is going to be a happy poem,
Of course then, I’m not going to mention what he said next, that doctor
He said sometimes
Sometimes the things in our head hurt so much that when left unexpressed and unattended to,
they begin to physically manifest themselves
(the heartburn, the stomachaches,
the nausea, the migraines,
the chest pains, the-)
That’s why you’ve been hurting, there’s nothing wrong with you really
Just your head.
Since this is going to be a happy poem,
I guess I can’t mention the look in my mother’s eyes as I lay in the suffocating white of a
hospital bed
Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t do this to yourself.
I gave you
Everything.
You did give me everything mother,
So I don’t know why despite the painkillers surging through my bloodstream
I still ached.
I know that this is supposed to be a happy poem,
And so I promise I won’t tell you that my brain has been conditioned into thinking that respite is
more fleeting and more temporary than the flicker of the dying sun on the ocean that weeps for
the shore,
And the only times I’ve felt at home in this body of mine have been-
(I don’t know, when?)
I won’t tell you that sometimes even when I’m a thousand miles away from home,
I still see the brown of my mother’s eyes reflecting my pain, her hand on my wrist that a needle
too many has suckled on
And she tells me not to do this to myself.
Perhaps the next poem will be happier.