Shall days be generations?

Greetings everyone, below is my entry for Vocal's "The Dragon Beside Me" challenge! Here's a poem about 3 generations of women who had influenced (and will continue to influence) my life, in not just the past and present, but future as well. I'll be doing a breakdown of it below, so read on!

P.S. (For those of you who have been attentive to my subtitles, yes... I'm working on a new poem album called "Volatile Souls", so stay tuned for more!)

29 February 2024, Before first light

Shall days be generations?

Day Zero.

They invaded our lands.

Tore into our houses;

Took us from our spouses;

And hung their flag

Flown high.

With crisis besetting;

An endless suffering-

You still chose to live.

To care.

To raise.

My mother up.

***

Day One.

She lives

She breathes,

She sings

Songs in the silent breeze.

***

Day Two.

She raises my little fingers,

Smiles at my tiny crinkles,

And cradles me

In loving arms.

Covering me

With gentle wings;

She lifts me up

To feel the breeze

***

Day Three.

I look into my backyard,

See a little car start,

And a tender little baby

Driving it.

Well how are you?

My daughter,

I asked

With such composure;

“I’ve never been so happy”

Blossoms a cheerful face.

***

For if Days

Are so numbered,

They’d ought

To be more treasured

As much

As generations;

With intricate

Details!

***

And although they’d say,

Third times the charm;

I’d very much love

Day zero and one

***

For without them,

I two…

Will not be born.

***

~ Beginning? ~

And that's it for my poem! Lets jump into the breakdown:

The first stanza focuses on my Grandmother and a specific era she lived through, and that was the World War 2 Era. Well...words could never describe how horrifying that time period was. The Japanese occupied her homeland, hence my usage of dismal diction and war motif in that stanza. Now imagine this... You are minding your business, going about your own life one day when suddenly, your country gets invaded and war breaks out.

Most people living in this modern world have not been through that kind of trauma. And most of us probably take the peace we have for granted.

We shouldn't.

To every Gen Z out there, that is what our Grandmothers had to go through in their youth.

So perhaps stop looking at your phone the next time you meet them, and actually talk to them...they are the strongest among us all, for going through and surviving that traumatising era...

Stanza 2 then presents my mother's generation, and depicts it in a rather peaceful vibe. It symbolises a more peaceful era as well, juxtaposed to that of my Grandmother's. Stanza 3, which also puts her in the spotlight, presents her taking on the role of a mother bravely, and bringing me up with nurture and care. A purposeful technique I threw in is the motif of a soft breeze to connect both our generations together, and to show how a Mother would want her child to experience same small pleasures she felt when she was a child herself, such as simply playing in the breeze while you are young.

Stanza 4 is a little more unique, as it talks about the next generation, a distant point in the future that I have not quite reached yet. In that stanza I take on the persona of a Father, who is happily spending time with his daughter in the backyard. It pictures a scenario where my daughter would be playing on one of those toy cars that children love, and I thought it would be an endearing idea that I could include in the poem.

Overall, I wrote this because I want to acknowledge the amount of influence that Women have in our lives, be it in the past, present or future, and also remind everyone of the troubles that every single one of them had/have to face in their lives. And that they'd still choose to press on, and bring forth the next generation into our world so that our stories would continue through our bloodline for ages to come.

So, I'm wishing all the women out there a very happy International Women's day, and a huge Thank you to the contributions you have made to not just your own families, but society as well!

***

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