burning skin & golden tears.
Leesburg, VA
2024, Senior, Poetry & Spoken Word
the sun has stretched her sweltering fingers into the year,
prolonging the already terrible heat of kenya’s autumn.
i was sitting on the porch of my uncle’s home,
the leafy tree blocking me from her unmerciful fingertips,
which reached down to me from above.
i shuffled my body to the right,
and there i was,
staring face-to-face with her.
but, my eyes squeezed shut.
why are you so aggressive now?
all those years ago,
her soft golden eyes peered down upon humankind,
not daring to hurt them.
she had once provided food to the vegetation instead of overheating their soil,
her burning hands now grabbing their roots, damaging and drying them out.
she had once allowed for both animals and humans alike to bask in her luminance,
her control strong enough to prevent her rays from becoming so cancerous,
not wanting to mar the skin of the beings she has watched over for centuries.
before,
she enveloped me in her warm arms.
she’d pepper my body with motherly kisses,
each peck, leaving behind beautiful freckles on my skin and in her wake.
but now—
now i cannot come near her without her warm embrace making me feel terribly nauseous.
without her once luscious blonde hair, now lackluster, constricting my throat and suffocating me.
i glanced up once more,
meeting her eyes, which were now a fiery shade of gold,
before rushing inside, desperate to escape her unbearable heat.
later that day,
i went down to the beach.
i watched as the parched camels bowed their heads,
their lips just inches below the sea line.
they gulped down the salty water of the indian ocean.
they too are exhausted from the sun’s piercing eyes and relentless embrace.
i stopped in my tracks,
my eyes unmoving from the sight of the camels.
i wondered why they looked like they were dying for a mere sip of water.
shouldn’t they be heat-resistant?
at least, that’s what my best friend in 2nd grade told me.
when i returned home,
i spent hours curled up in bed,
longing to find out what had changed from my first visit to kenya to now.
my fingers quickly worked to open google as i typed: “why is it getting hotter?”
climate change.
i recalled a lesson i had learnt about climate change in kindergarten.
my unsteady hands writing: tern of the lits (turn off the lights), and compost fod (compost food).
i laid awake, staring at the ceiling,
realizing the sun’s anger was not her own doing,
but a cry to help from the earth,
unnoticed for years.
i wondered if the sun felt sorrow,
watching her light turn into a weapon,
blazing the land she once looked down upon with loving eyes.
has she knelt on her knees after setting, begging for forgiveness from the heavens which she lit?
did she weep golden tears for the oceans, which evaporated as she breathed in their moisture?
for the camels who looked so exhausted just from standing in her presence?
the next morning,
i rose with the sun,
an ache engraved painfully into my heart—desperation sitting heavy on my tongue,
a need to fight for the future of kenya—for our earth,
to protect us from her sweltering fingers, as she too was desperate for relief.
i wished to curl her tensed fingers back to the palm of her hand,
placing a gentle kiss on her knuckles,
just like she had once done to my skin.
i wished to utter the words of understanding,
the words she had been in dire need to hear: it is not your fault.
at that moment, i realized that it is not impossible.
that we can turn off the lights,
conserve food and water, rally against corrupt politicians,
that we can nurture the earth back to health.
so that once again,
the sun can shine gently,
and her eyes will return to a soft golden shade,
crinkling as she smiles down upon us all.
Reflection
Many people believe the sun is at fault for climate change. That humans have tried our best to stop “what the sun has caused”, but ultimately failed, meaning there is nothing more that we can do. I wrote this poem in an attempt to encapsulate the feeling of the sun—what the sun might think of humans as we blame it for the destruction slowly decaying our Earth. To the people who end up reading this poem, I hope I could convey the feelings of the sun in an adequate way and I hope that this poem allows others to feel deeper, to connect with the Earth and the Sun—to want to change their ways for the better. No matter how small our changes are, whether that be recycling or turning off the lights, to deciding to protest at a local event---your thoughts and decisions to help the Earth matter.