When the music hits it feels so good
Pero esas cumbias hit different
All over my body
the same way
the pain
rides through my nervous system
infecting every bit of me that moves
with every breath
every step
and the blink of my eyes
jumping across the pain scale
4 to 10 in less than 5 on a good day a solid 7 and you just
grin AND BEAR IT
It used to be you had to hide
the feelings that infect you deep inside
Clench your teeth
(to the gritty grinding of the beat)
Jaw gets tighter
(extracting the high pitched twinging in your ears)
melodically balanced
with the gentle bravado
of your ex-halation
An ex-altation to the pain
grooving to the sweet sounds
of the orchestra
A cacophony of oppression
reverberating from my soul
my body a conduit between
this new age suffering
and our historic struggle
manifesting into this silent battle
that I fight
migraine to migraine
backache to backache
Every sleepless night
Music is my liberation
the medicine to my soul
the bridge between two realms in which
I coexist
Longing to return
to the bittersweet nest
where the music echos into the waves
and travels oceans far and wide
just to find me again
This poems is one of many in Clara Olivo’s debut book/poetry collection, The Whisper, The Storm and The Light In Between from Alegria Publishing.
