Boy Oh BOy .
Oh BOy. The bound up BOy. Crushed beneath the pressure, the grind to be tough and strong. Big. The overwhelming wave of responsibility to save everything from time, to the environment – the world itself. But I’ve seen the BOy dance and cry. Read poetry out loud. Wear makeup. Pick flowers. Speak his truth. Challenge his world. Name his feelings. Play piano and sing. Hug another BOy.
BOy oh BOy I cried…and a dream saw hands on the wheel of change. Ploughing a culture in where the feelings, vulnerabilities and experiences of men and BOys cannot be freely expressed and accepted. Burying the angst that has the potential of bringing BOy to his own end.
BOy oh BOy said the dream … may ideals and expectations of the BOy be reset, redrawn. May BOy be moved and freed from his grueling vigil by the roar for change. The momentum of the march towards it. And the wonder at a way and time when BOy is no longer required to be just one of the boys anymore.
(Clunk & Jam book, 2019).
And anyway, fixing is rarely quick and some things are better left alone – like the notion of the Super Hero and this whole saving the world business.
(Clunk & Jam book)
Was it at all possible to know where he’d end up next? Skipping tomorrow and the next day and the next was no great way to travel but it seemed the only way of leaving well behind where he’d come from. But maybe his place wasn’t up ahead somewhere, beyond the days (and the daze). Maybe there wasn’t such a thing as a ‘right place’ after all – which left him free to travel with absolutely no idea where he was going…
(BOy Series, Clunk & Jam book, 2019)
Sometimes when answers can’t be found – questioning is a good alternative … like why is a BOy suppose to have all the answers anyway? Who’s a BOy to turn to when he’s not sure what to do or where to go? How’s a BOy suppose to live up to all these BIG expectations? What if a BOy can’t? Doesn’t want to? Doesn’t think he can? Doesn’t believe he’s good enough? And what if he doesn’t want to be like all the other BOys? If he doesn’t fit in – then where’s a BOy belong? And if a BOy can’t stop the trees from falling and the ice from melting- what then? What if a BOy doesn’t have answers to these questions – doesn’t that mean he’s not as alone as he thinks he is?
(BOy Series, Clunk & Jam book, 2019)
Butterfly Tears .
She imagined her tears as butterflies on strings, knowing that to truly transform the sad, she had to rise up on her own steam and snip them forever free. Not that they went away forever. Just so they could gently move and hover – not spin and crush.
(Reposted from 2011. Find her in Clunk & Jam book, 2019.)
Forever waiting.
Every time she thought she’d nearly got there, down came disappointment. All this waiting and wanting was getting her nowhere. So she decided to break the chains of waiting with a fierce determination to be a more grown up, independently mobile, self directed and time saving type.
(Reposted from 2011. Find her in Clunk & Jam book, 2019.)
