Avalanche

In mid-March 2020 we all went home. In my case, I grabbed the laptop off my desk and ran around taking photos of student work like crazy. For the last hour or so I simply sat at my desk and stared at the whiteboard. The impending sense of both transformation and doom rendered me powerless.

Then, until mid-June we were chained to our screens and tables; Google Meet and Zoom took over everything. There were no boundaries: teachers replied to email from dawn til midnight all over the globe. I developed spider veins in my legs from lack of motion.

By April all my plans for the future dissolved: they simply didn’t exist anymore. I’d planned to move…to start a new life in the country of my birth. My child would grow to love my birth country too. He would be able to grow strong and true with extended family. That plan is no longer feasible. Without even getting ill, Covid-19 has not just eaten up my time, it has ravaged my options in unexpected ways.

I experience now a deep gratitude for what I hold most dear, and a humbling appreciation for the bounty of this land, Turkey, that I have called home for 22 years. Despite the gratitude, the specters of my previous hopes and dreams still appear before me. I still believe anything is possible, if it is for the best.

During this time, from so very far away, I watched my own country crumble and fall apart. There are daily assaults on basic medical practices…daily protests aimed to place individual preferences above the obligation to safeguard each others’ well being…daily efforts to turn the simple and considerate act of following globally recognized standards of health into a political statement. The number of our dead far surpasses that of any other nation, and it didn’t need to be that way. My heart sinks with disappointment in our selfishness.

On another front entirely, there’s a tidal swell of discontent and outrage over the endemic, systemic bias against select groups of citizen. It is with worry that I see that we are still working through this struggle all these years later. My heart swells with pride as I watch how communities of all classes and colors have united behind this struggle, and how the resulting demonstrations are usually peaceful and mindful of protecting each others’ health during this fragile time. That is no major feat to accomplish considering the emotional nature of the subject. That united community is one good thing coming out of the general awfulness.

The national discourse on all topics from our topmost leadership can no longer be called discourse: it is coarse, crass, confused mud-slinging. The mud slinging and name calling continues all day through the nationally broadcast simplistic tweets of a man who met his third wife through pedophile and pimp extraordinaire Jeffrey Epstein, or so Epstein proudly proclaimed until the PR people stepped in. The extreme lack of charitableness and mercy, and the utter absence of grace, taste, and depth embodied in this man are now the supreme example of leadership traits for our youth…these traits of our current leadership form a black hole amongst the bright stars of the sky, sucking away at the aspirations of our future generations.

This time of general isolation has strengthened my faith. I’ve had time to reconsider the wisdom of pursuing my goals. While I long to return home, perhaps with all this turmoil there is a reason my plans have been stalled or even cut off permanently. I pray and wait to see what the future will hold.

The free verse poem and painting in this post are inspired by these circumstances and by Psalm 144, a psalm of safe-guarding, deliverance,prosperity, faith, and intervention.

AVALANCHE

It’s sudden crushing weight

blocked her

safe passage home

through mountains rugged

and time worn.

Her return thwarted,

the wandering lion

regards the bounty,

the beauty,

that remains.

It is more than enough.

Yet,

Her claws are trained for

battle,

her maw is set

to roar

so to rouse

the slumbering

from their long, dark, sleep.

With waning, weakening limbs

and thinning pelt

she holds back that bite,

holds with all her strength,

so her pride is not lost.

She turns to

You

Asking for

Deliverence

from raging, unkempt storms,

Surely,

There will be some change

Drifting in…one day.

Your lion waits.

And waits.

And waits.

She is

Your lion

Still.