Last year, it was “A Thank You Note on My Birthday”. This year, it’s a pledge.

Photo by Pink Sherbet Photography

Who Needs a Birthday Wish?
(a birthday poem by RJ, April 8, 2010)

When 230,000 people died in Haiti
And when hundreds more died in Chile?

When the world is slowly dying
And all of us with it?
When the truth’s become inconvenient
And the earth’s poles are shifted?

When NoKor trained its nukes
On all the world but itself?
Who, dear Lord would listen
To our desperate cries for help?

When a trainer gets killed
By her very own whale?
When secrets are peddled,
And lies are for sale?

When 57 people died
In a pre-elections convoy?
Because someone pulls the trigger
All too often like to a toy?

When a hundred mothers die
Everyday while giving birth?
When even more babies
Are thrown in the cold, damp dirt?

When 24% of the population
Consider themselves poor?
Yet the truth is more than that,
Yes more than that, I’m sure!

Is there a reason to ask
For a wish so unfeeling and cold,
When some people
Don’t even live to be a year old?

When people just “vanish”
Into thin air unexplained?
Just because they’re brave enough
To emancipate us, the enslaved!

When others spend their birthdays
Unconscious on a hospital bed?
When some are blind, some are dying
Or would never hear what I said?

Do I have one good reason
To ask for a birthday wish?
I want so much to ask for one,
Give me a reason, if you please?

Because today is my birthday,
My 31st.
And if there’s anything I want
The world to know, it is this:

The world doesn’t need
Another selfish birthday wish.
Too much has been requested,
Yet too few pledges have been made.

So today I make this pledge before you
And hope that you do the same
Long after my last birthday
May you remember why I came

To seek reconciliation and not enmity
To foster friendship and not animosity

To stop being selfish
And start being selfless

To count my blessings
And never the cost
To give what I can now
And forget what is lost.

To choose to see the good
But not to look away from the bad
To bring people together
And not separate them — that’s sad.

To heal past wounds
And not rub them again.
To be more forgiving, understanding
And not dwell on the pain.

To think less of me and more of you
To be more than a friend,
But a sister to you.

Because I have enough
And probably even more,
But like most people,
They wouldn’t admit to it, for sure.

We don’t need more diseases
What we need is a cure
We don’t need more pundits
With their thoughts so obscure

All we need is a little tolerance
Consideration and acceptance
A little more patience
A shot at deliverance.

This isn’t rocket science,
Not geekery-inspired.
Just a glimpse of the thoughts
I have here inside.

The flowers you give,
Soon enough may wilt.
And the words that you utter
Won’t wash away the guilt.

So make my day special
But don’t bother spending much
Diamonds and pearls,
I’m not a sucker for such.

If you’re thankful I’m alive,
If I bring you such pride,
It’s enough that you assure me
You’ll always be by my side.

Yes, remember this day
This day I was born.
But forget not, my brother
That this day isn’t mine alone.

So treat me no better today
Like you would tomorrow
Or like you did yesterday.

Because,

Though there’s nothing I stole
My life is but a borrowed role
And I am no more important
Than another human soul.

*****
Happy birthday dear April 8 celebrants! May you find meaning in your life by living for others. And may you never have to celebrate your birthday alone.