Poetry: A Gentle Man
You are a tender hearted man, he says, and it suits you.
It’s true.
I wear gentleness as a coat that was stitched for me at birth,
that has grown as I have grown,
wearing and tearing and bearing the stretch marks of childhood, adolescence and maturity.
That doesn’t mean I have always appreciated the fit.
I didn't always like being gentle.
I saw myself being talked at,
pushed over,
non-existent,
and I was through with being gentle,
threw the coat back in the wardrobe,
pulled out something else
—anything else—
to wear.
I tried on lavish coats,
loud coats,
warm coats,
thick coats,
thin coats,
light coats,
coloured coats,
striped coats,
drab coats,
fun coats,
anyone else’s coats but mine,
anything to match the fit of the old,
but for all my trying there were none to be found.
And I found,
to my surprise,
at the back of the wardrobe,
in the wake of coats strewn left and right,
my old coat still right there on the hanger,
ready to be tried on one more time.
And,
it fit.
And for the first time,
I felt comfortable wearing it.
Each stitch glimmering afresh,
because I saw now:
each was hand stitched for me
and so I rolled up both my sleeves.
Now I don’t see gentleness as being talked at,
but as holding up a mirror to someone else and letting them see what it reveals.
Now I don’t see gentleness as being pushed over,
but as bending as a bamboo shoot in a breeze.
Now I don’t see gentleness as being non-existent,
but as being more alive and present than ever before, as being myself, as being.
Those who see me say that it is true.
God who sees me says that it is true.
I who see myself know it to be true.
That I am gentle, through and through and through.
So as I walk out into the cold today,
I put on my coat once more,
embraced by the fit,
and the way that it sits between each of my shoulders,
I ready myself,
and allow myself,
and love myself enough
to be gentle.
Because I am gentle.
And gentle is who I am.
~
Etienne Wain is currently a law and economics student at Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University of Wellington.