[I badly love kids. I love staring at their eyes. I love their innocence. Now this one, which I copied from my wordpress, is just a manifestation of that. Kids even haunt me in dreams. :)]
I am lying here on a swing tied on two coconut trees that have grown with me. The elevated area whose soil has been tattered by frequent erosion still remains to be the only place in the world where my tears are free to roll down. But it wasn’t grief this time that is burning inside of me. I am like in a mood swayed by a tranquil lullaby. I am feeling so calm, so restful, and so comfortable that I may not care what happens next or around. All I know is that I am not alone. I feel a soft weight in my chest and noticed constant short breaths. I looked down only to find out that the two most innocent eyes the world hasn’t seen yet are directed to me. They are sparkling. This baby boy’s eyes are very familiar. His eyebrows are hesitatingly short and the eyelids follow a very familiar pattern. There’s no mistaking about it. He looks perfectly like me when I was young.
All the images then go flashing as I try to project what this baby boy in my chest will be when he gets older. I can see him carrying a dysfunctional toy gun I bought him weeks ago while crying as well because no water comes out of it. I watch him hide slyly behind the curtain of my room as he tries not to let me notice that his first-ever white polo I bought for school is tainted by his favorite chocolate. I look at how he willfully tries to pronounce the words written in his illustration book that were already taught by his kindergarten teacher last morning. I hear him screaming when he unintentionally lets go of an animated balloon already flying above the chapel after we came out of the church one Sunday. I cover his two little eyes every time he shrieks watching a horror film after we took dinner. I witness him running swiftly to the comfort room as he attempts to cover the fact he was swimming at hot daytime and I hate that. I feel his tiny palms rubbing my cheeks trying to wake me up as he sees an old man selling hot breads for breakfast. Then I see him running towards me now, with his tears all over the place and his arms wide open ready for a comforting embrace, telling me that he was scolded by his mom.
He calls me now through the phone telling me that he won a national competition that I did not win when I was his age right now. I can smell his t-shirt after giving it to me during the break of a badminton finals tournament he is playing. I cry as well listening to his speech at a high school graduation as he mimics how I yelled at him every time I caught him already sleeping before the rest time during his study periods. One summer afternoon, I see him gently closing his eyes as he soulfully plays his violin using lower keys when he realized that I was already playing our favorite classic melody on the piano. He shakily introduces a young woman, who he describes as special, not knowing though that I have full confidence with that girl by
examining her expressions. The last image of him that I see is on a bus station. He rubs my back and assures me that he is definitely ready to travel far for College.
I just smiled after all those images slowly faded leading me to stare once more to the child that is now already sleeping in my chest. He makes indistinguishable whispers and sounds. But one word struck the humanity inside of me when I heard him say, “Papa”. I heard the softest voice in the most serene place and in the most perfect moment. I want him now to grow old fast and gain consciousness so that I can tell him how much I would treasure to have a son like him the way I want him to be. He just doesn’t know the extent of my emotions and the distance of what I am dreaming for him.
But I guess things will always be late for me. I heard several footsteps from behind me. Someone was calling me and another name which I assume is the baby’s. She laughed maybe looking from behind the image of me and the sleeping child on my chest. Her voice is absolutely one I have never heard before. She’s on my back now telling me to sleep because I deserve a long and deep rest. I have no chance to see who it was as I close my eyes too. I figured out that I have never been this tired my whole life and yes, I deserve a rest. I hugged the baby in my chest tightly as the woman rubs my back. I smiled and slept. Everything in the world has been worth living. #
