Passing Phase
I.
How does it start? It starts in pain, and suffering, and claustrophobic desire to be something more than an appendage.
It starts in the village or the crowded suburb. It starts when you realize that the fantasy of the smiling faces elsewhere aren’t fantasy at all — there is a place like that.
It starts when the dry mud and shit drying on the shoes you saved up for is no longer just a nuisance, but a cruel reminder of where you are. It starts when too many neighbours have fallen ill. When too much potential has been wasted. It starts when premature funerals are happening earlier; becoming more common. It starts when your home is burned to the ground by one of the neighbours who does not look like you, assisted by policemen who also don’t look like you.
It starts when they also look like you, but still insist you are still less than.
It starts when you have a family or you realize you want one and you don’t want them to experience that which you have. It starts when time is measured in people, not days nor weeks, nor years.
It starts when you’re the only one left.
II.
And then you arrive on the shores. You exhale for the first time in your life.
You take another breath and there’s actually more air to be breathed. Energy to be used. Fuel for the unknown but promising future you thought existed exclusively on those screens and in those books.
And you toil. You relish. You relish in the toil and you celebrate the fruits of your labour because this time there’s more than enough for the people who depend on you and you who depends on you.
And the toil is good, because life is better and life is better because it finally feels like life, not just passing time.
But although you are in, you are still on the outside. There are names, and slurs, and insults — oh the insults! Other bodies fare worse than others with the beatings and damage that causes the wrong kind of homesickness.
But you tell yourself that despite the names and the misdeeds you are here. Being here is what matters more. It is better to be treated as an outsider in than an outsider out. It could be worse. You have seen worse. You believe you have seen worse. Nothing could be worse. You can swallow the lesser pain to avoid the greater you think you know. You toil and you smile and you endure, but by then it is too late. Worse can come for you. Worse can come for your children.
It starts with silence. It ends back at the beginning, in fire.
