July 25: Dreams, Poet of the Week, Camille T. Dungy, "Pity"

Camille T. Dungy is the Poet of the Week.  I'm not really familiar with her work, but I came across her poem "Pity," and, for obvious reasons, it appealed to me quite a bit.

It's about Christ and suffering.  It's about a woman and mother.  It's about not losing yourself or your dreams, or perhaps allowing your dreams to evolve.  I'm not quite sure.  However, I know how family changes your values.

Over twenty years ago, I was all about writing and publishing and teaching.  Then I got married.  Then I had a daughter.  Eight years later, a son.  I'm not going to lie, though.  Sometimes, late at night when I'm lying in bed, thinking about my life, I still think about being a full-time writer and teacher.  How my life hasn't turned out exactly the way I planned.

But, sometimes God has other plans.  Better plans.

Saint Marty is just here to play his part.

Pity

by:  Camille T. Dungy

Christ bore what suffering he could and died

a young man, but you waited years to learn

how to heal. Only when you could did you

touch the man whose body blistered for yours.

You posted him no news for sixteen terms,

then just a signed graduation notice.

The letter he wrote that week asked only,

Now that your books are closed, can boys come in?

At your wedding, you buried the woman

you thought you knew inside a stranger’s name.

This is how you found yourself: thirty-three,

nursing a son. Soon there was another.

Your mind had already begun to walk.

But you were a mother. Those cribs held you.