2. I Am that I Am

From Dawn Will Break (2002)

I am a Panamanian,
harvesting bananas in the hot and steamy summer
of the brightly-sweltered sun.

I am a soldier, fighting,
brutal, fierce, a terror in the night,
aged down with all my eight years.

I am a sweeper down below,
unworded and unworthy and unvisible,
eyes choosing not, chosen not.

I am a widow’s daughter,
widowed now herself, alone
and weeping by the cold blue flicker.

I am orphaned,
my sores the wounds of AIDS itself,
inheritance, not mine, unwanted.

I am lonely, hungry, beaten, bruised.
Rejected, scorned, I mourn.

Behold, I am the One you crushed.

I am.
I am.
I am.

Composed April and May 2002 by Mark Feezell / DrFeezell.com
Included in Feezell’s poetry collection Dawn Will Break (2002)
Dedicated to the Public Domain (CC0 1.0) 2024

Download as an RTF file.

Image: Waterfall on Rocks (DSC03373)

poetry, Dawn Will Break (2002)