![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dream defered
Feb. 21st, 2006 09:37 pmWhat happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
-langston hughes
This has been my favorite poem for years (followed closely by Yeats-"The Second Comeing".) The deceptively simple and sparse lines are beautifully crafted, their tempo rolling off of the tounge in a slow fall, as if hesitant to show themself for fear of what they might reveal.
I've always looked at it in a social level, brushing on the personal only when I considered personal dreams crushed by culture's weight. I think this is really because I first read this poem at a time in my life where I had no dreams really, no longterm asperations other than to know myself and make others happy, to help fufill others dreams.
In a few years, I met Melissa while looking for someone who needed my help and who completed me. I didn't know that's what I was looking for, but it was. She blew into my life like a redheaded whirlwind, sweeping me up in her turbulent beautiful passion, giving me purpose and drive to actually DO. For 6 years I stood side by side with her, supporting her as she supported me, sharing the deepest secrets of each others souls. When I told her I was trans almost 3 years ago, I put Melissa's life on hold, and her dreams were stopped in their tracks. I hoped that the dreams that she had given me over the years would be close enough for her that she could find herself in them, but this wasn't the case.
Now, probably 15 years after I first read this poem, I have my second full revelation about it. Not only is it a poem about a people, it is a poem about a person, every person. Dreams aren't just what you do or want to do with your life, they are part and parcel of how you live your life and how you love someone. My dreams of a faimly with Melissa wont' ever come true, so I have to put them aside now. I don't know how to do that, but I think I must learn, or do what Melissa has done to herself for the past 3 years... what I have done to her.
The problem with dreams is that everyone has them.. and they can't all come true.
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
-langston hughes
This has been my favorite poem for years (followed closely by Yeats-"The Second Comeing".) The deceptively simple and sparse lines are beautifully crafted, their tempo rolling off of the tounge in a slow fall, as if hesitant to show themself for fear of what they might reveal.
I've always looked at it in a social level, brushing on the personal only when I considered personal dreams crushed by culture's weight. I think this is really because I first read this poem at a time in my life where I had no dreams really, no longterm asperations other than to know myself and make others happy, to help fufill others dreams.
In a few years, I met Melissa while looking for someone who needed my help and who completed me. I didn't know that's what I was looking for, but it was. She blew into my life like a redheaded whirlwind, sweeping me up in her turbulent beautiful passion, giving me purpose and drive to actually DO. For 6 years I stood side by side with her, supporting her as she supported me, sharing the deepest secrets of each others souls. When I told her I was trans almost 3 years ago, I put Melissa's life on hold, and her dreams were stopped in their tracks. I hoped that the dreams that she had given me over the years would be close enough for her that she could find herself in them, but this wasn't the case.
Now, probably 15 years after I first read this poem, I have my second full revelation about it. Not only is it a poem about a people, it is a poem about a person, every person. Dreams aren't just what you do or want to do with your life, they are part and parcel of how you live your life and how you love someone. My dreams of a faimly with Melissa wont' ever come true, so I have to put them aside now. I don't know how to do that, but I think I must learn, or do what Melissa has done to herself for the past 3 years... what I have done to her.
The problem with dreams is that everyone has them.. and they can't all come true.
