The Cycles of Life
by chosen sunflower –
I would like to share with you, a few of my many names, I am Mbaliyekhethelo and it means chosen flower. I am one person with many personalities that come out when I write, draw, speak or even perform and because of them, I present myself to be a gender-nonconforming person.
This piece is written by Sunflower. A flower that is grows by following the rays of the Sun, a personality that seeks warmth in the light as to avoid being cold during the winter season.
It’s almost autumn and the trees about to shed from their greens to their yellows, oranges and browns. If you’re lucky enough, you might catch the passion that comes with some of the red changing leaves, a fiery season with chilling winds and terrifying thunderstorms.
This poem was written from a flower sprouting out from in between the cracks of the road on the highway, continuing to grow with the seasonal rainfall and daily Sunshine, should be getting rest when the moon arises but instead listens to the engines zoom past. Absorbing the toxins from the fuel infused smoke, said to be unhealthy even though I’m fuelled by polluted air because beauty comes with strength and persist in order to grow, a flower preparing to bloom by the next spring in their current predicament.
When you find a pen
and some paper
go find a quiet spot in your mind
and take time to process your thoughts.
Things are coming and going,
the bad memories are the ones that are intrusive
whilst they drown out the good ones.
Words may be flying in from one ear and out the other.
Whispers from your inner voice
start to play tricks on you.
Flashing moments of happiness
try to ease your self-induced guilt,
just because you can’t get over
whatever traumas that have encapsulated
your un-wellbeing.
As you put ink to use,
helping you draw up words with hopes
of assisting you in expressing your bottled up emotions,
the demons that have imprisoned you in
a state of depressive insecurity, self-loathing
that flip, switch and split between extreme states
of happiness that feel unreal.
As if you weren’t blessed enough to
experience joy for brief moments in your life
because you constantly blame yourself
for someone else snatching it from you…
It is your fault.
It is your fault for not
taking back what is rightfully yours
but I understand… Sometimes…
sometimes it just isn’t worth the fight.
Relax;
put those tiresome words
that constantly ring like a gong,
echoing in your ears,
to silence.
Let those anti-progressive thoughts
that torment your very sleep
come to go and pass.
Don’t allow for them to cause harm.
Farm through your emotions
Eat and enjoy the fresh flavours of each season.
Go through the garden, and harvest the ripe ones.
Ziff through the rotten ones,
throw them out, allow for them to be the compost
to grow new ones.
You are going through the cycles of life.
The cycles of the mind,
reconnecting with the soul you once lost,
fuelled by the blood pumped by your ever loving heart.
-Sunflower
