Words never made sense

 Through the black and white the letters escaped,
 and every word made sense to me
 from the paper into my heart they seeped,
 Once upon a time ago, far, far away from equality,
 lived a boy who was illiterate.
 
 “Mommy, what are those funny lines and shapes?”
 because words never made sense to him.
 “I wouldn’t know my darling child”, the mother whispered,
 “I grew up in a castle ruled by only kings
 and where the princesses belonged in the kitchen.”
   
Days passed, and a grave tragedy took place,
to the boy, whom words never made sense to.
Time froze as the young boy turned into an orphan overnight,
and he decides to drown his dreams in ‘child labour’,
to feed his hungry little sisters

Years later, he was a young lover, fighting his country’s battles,
and words never made sense to him.
Worse than the gunshots, what pained his brave heart was,
how every ceaseless ‘I miss you’ he longed to whisper,
got lost as he could never pen her.

He then became a proud father to a daughter,
to whom he assured, that words made sense.
Blessed her with knowledge, gave her the life he never had,
and crowned her a queen in her own castle.
Yet hidden, remained his sacrifices, as never once could he journal.

Years passed, now an old man in an Elder’s home,
pondering how words never made sense to him.
Once more abandoned by his own blood.
A tear dribbled down his withered cheeks as he pictured,
the shame in his daughter’s eyes towards her illiterate father.

The heart-rending ‘the end’,
soaked my cheeks,
my heart ached for the eyes that never saw life
beyond the pages of black and white,
trying to give meaning to a cluster of shapes and lines.

Thus, let us fight for basic educational rights,
so that to every soul, words would forever make sense.
Every human deserves a chance to write their own fairy tale,
and to narrate their happily ever after,
the end.

Rtr.  Ama Upeka Perera

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