Little Stories
Little Stories was written in October of 2021 for this project.
This poem is inspired by my habit of people watching! I've always enjoyed watching as others go about their lives, and I often get lost in thinking about the amazing ccmplexity across so many individuals.
For this poem, I thought I'd try to speak to the beauty in in recognizing humanity.
Themes:
- People Watching
- Imagination
All I can think of
As I sit upon this bench
Are the lives,
the
Little stories
of
Every passer-by.
Who are they beneath
The guise,
behind
The mask?
Do they control the image
They project, does it
Control them?
Where do they begin and end,
To whom are they coming home—
Is there even home to return to?
When young and green,
Did they, too, find themselves
Lost and yearning, searching,
In need of a name and persona?
Was their childhood stolen
By shadows and terror,
Consumed by pain as well?
I see her,
trenchcoat and
Determined walk
Business woman prudent and mighty
But barren and lacking in love.
I see him,
manicured and blithe,
Delicate and timid with
Overflowing passion and zeal,
But fatally directionless.
Faces and names,
Heartbreak and longing,
It’s a beautiful swirl of
Humanity and
soul.
And as I rise from my bench
I can’t help but feel the
Loving embrace of
eyes and hearts
All around me.
How my story,
too,
Will find its way into the
Chronicle of
passers-by.
I smile to the Jane Doe
Walking past as I make
My way home.
The narrator relfects on the infinite possible lives and
storiesas they people-watch.
These questions seem to reveal a life of trauma in the
narrator, and the try to relate to the people they see passing by through asking
and giving their hypothetical answers.
The narrator invents stories for the random people they
see walking by.
They fantasize about being the subject of others'
people-watching, craving that feeling of mutual connection.
They smile to the passing woman, feeling connected to her
as they continue to weave these narratives for everyone they encounter, including
her.