I Am Water

On being blamed for the storm you were forced to become

They blamed the river for the flood.

No one asked

How long had it been raining?

Nobody questioned

the houses built on the banks,

the roots torn up,

the soil that had nothing left

to hold.

They feared the sea

for sweeping them away,

forgetting they were the ones

who walked to the edge.

Who cut the mangroves?

Who stripped the shore

of everything

that once kept it gentle.

They cursed the ocean

for the hurricane,

never wondering

How many seasons of silence

It took to build that storm,

or how they had warmed the world

It was forced to live in.

I am all three.

I am water.

Provoked slowly,

Then, they blamed suddenly.

But no one drowned

in something they never entered.

No one was swept away

from shores they never approached.

My waves were never wrath.

It was just the rain

You refused to stand in,

and blamed me for the wet.

I overflowed because I had nothing to hold onto.

I overflowed because I was full.

— Awari