My Passion

A poem by BRENDA SMITH

My Passion

As I think of the jobs I could have had and the
   money and material things I could have gained,
I often wonder why did, at the time of acceptance,
   my mind go temporarily insane.
But then I realize that to leave my mark, I must
   do something grand;
I must do something to impact the lives of others,
   something amazing, something Christ-like;
I must look deep into my soul and pull out
   passions that manifest within.

I must forget about those material things, forget
   limitations andignorance set by my fellow man;
I must understand that with pursuing this
   passion, the provisions will be provided for my
   plans.

You can see it for what it's like in your life, pull out
   what motivates your fight, but for the children
   we must make amends. We owe them for the
   misinformation, the miseducation, for the
   wrongs created in this land, the land of the free,
   the home of the brave, the constitutionally
   bounded to equal rights for all men.

Yet our children lack equality in education.
This land has created the illusion of so
   many economic woes and such financial demise
   that it is okay that education of lower-income
   communities be put to the side.

Give them no option, no mind.

Train them for what they’re worth; everybody
   needs McDonald fries, shoes need to be shined,
   and don’t forget that taxes regulate, jails
   be filled.

America is in bigger debt than it knows and not
   ready to repay.

But I’ve decided it is our duty to change this
   system of insufficient funds.
Insufficient funds to buy books, to pay teachers, to
   adequately provide health care.

So if it means that upon acceptance I was
   temporarily insane, then consider me unchanged, and temporarily has become
   permanently my state of mind and at all cost,
   I am repaying my debt, I am leaving my mark.

I am passionately driven, and for the wrongs I
   chose to make amends.