How Do You
By: Nicole Busch
How, asks the college freshman, do you stand
out where there are so many other people.
Become an individual, with many
other influences, telling you what to
do. Being proctors
like a football coach
forcing you what to do.
Yelling left and
right, getting in your face, making a scene.
Like a train, steam coming out of their ears.
Know what to wear, and on what day of the
week; being so caught up in homework that
you sometimes forget to sleep or eat meals.
Wanting everyone’s outside opinion,
but dreading every word they speak, like a
cat not wanting a bath, or a chick so
afraid of flying. The
look in their eyes
pleading and begging for help, wide eyed and
knees shaking. Become
the best you can be,
not only in school, but in life. Strive for
greatness, power, courage and happiness.
Set your limits and goals to maximum
height, superior to the sky, to space.
It’s like you stretch your arms high above your
head, like a giraffe stretching their neck, or
a elephant stretching their trunk, curious
to what is out there.
The curious look
on their face when searching, and then changes to the
exciting look, like a kid, when they make
a new and interesting discovery.
So does anyone know what I’m talking
about? Says the college freshman, cautious.
How do you
BY KABIR
TRANSLATED FROM THE HINDI BY ARVIND KRISHNA MEHROTRA
How do you,
Asks the chief of police,
Patrol a city
Where the butcher shops
Are guarded by vultures;
Where bulls get pregnant,
Cows are barren,
And calves give milk
Three times a day;
Where mice are boatmen
And tomcats the boats
They row;
Where frogs keep snakes
As watchdogs,
And jackals
Go after lions?
Does anyone know
What I’m talking about?
Says Kabir.
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