Someone

Ilona Elliott

Sometimes her mind goes wandering and takes her back in time

To when dreams were possibilities and the future, undefined

When time stretched out in front of her like endless golden threads

Reaching to eternity, too young to understand,

That time is such a luxury it’s wasted in young hands

Her family roots are humble, not those of dreamers or explorers,

But the babies of poor immigrants, blue collar workers all of them

Who taught their children modesty in the things they could expect

And lived their short lives stoically, hiding their regrets

Beneath layers of obligations

And duties of respect

So she wrapped her dreams in secrecy and hid them on a shelf,

Deferring all of her desires to the needs of someone else

Until those dreams were nothing more than stifled sacrifice

To the endless demands of family and of being a good wife,

Now she sits here rocking quietly and dreams of another life.

If they’d given her permission to take her dreams and run

To walk the sands of distant shores or fly into the sun

To explore new possibilities

To stretch herself, to reach

Who knows what things she might have seen,

What things she might have done

She’s sure that at the very least,

She would have been

Someone.

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• Posted in: Poems ♦ Women's Issues
• Tagged: Career, Lifestyle, Poetry, womens' issues