Adversity Armour: How We Find Joy In Spite of hardship
(Art by Zara, September 10, 2019)
Like the fiery wrath of Apollo’s roaring arrows, the reckless sunlight burned our skin and pulverized our flesh, until only battle scars like scrawny, pink worms remained. The vicious sweat that pooled in our armpits, caked our back, and drooled off our foreheads began to sizzle in the heat and crawl like parasites into our pupils. Despite this “glorious” reign of Texan summer, here we were: an overcooked batch of middle and highschool students about to celebrate the beauty of life and nature—an outdoor, ekphrastic poetry reading. How lovely.
A pop-up stage with a podium was stuffed in the back of the museums’ garden, while lawn-chair seats were squeezed into semi-neat rows. Slumped in the first row, reserved for presenters, was a majority of young black and brown and blonde haired students glistening in the heat. But, near the end of the row, was a distinct cluster of gray—a few older, retired men and women patiently, patiently awaiting the poetry reading to commence. To my surprise, they were participants too.
When submitting to the ekphrastic poetry competition, it hadn’t occurred to me that any age could apply. I was accustomed to the bee-like swarms of highschool and middle school students, gleaming with ambition, scraveling for accolades; the calm, unbothered demeanor of the elderly poets was unfamiliar to me.
“Everyone, please take your seats. We are going to begin now.” the coordinators managed to chirp into the microphone.
A middle school boy lugged himself into a brittle chair, flung grease off his forehead, and whined about the heat. Though none of us acknowledged him, he was right. The sun weighed down on us like layers of sickening black soot, gnawing into our skin layer by layer. We were miserable.
One by one, we were summoned to the stage to read our winning poems in front of the display of the art. But, the microphone cut in and out, perhaps also suffocating from the heat, while guests and even some parents escaped to the air conditioned building. As they called the last couple readers, a man with wispy gray hair nearly pranced to the podium. Though his hands were vigorously shaking, his paper crinkling with every step, his lips were curled up into a vibrant smile. This smile, so pure and untroubled, made it seem as if he had no sensation of the outrage of heat that could certainly melt pruned skin and fragile frame. Somehow, this elderly man was resistant in a way that nearly all the audience members begged to know. He performed his poem, based on Bruce Green’s painting With No Roof but a Resistol.
Bruce Green, With No Roof But a Resitol
It was breathtaking.
To hear this man’s voice laced with passion and emotion, to see his smile, lips slightly crooked and eyes nothing more than crescent moons, and to feel the pure bliss brimming inside of him, I too almost forgot the pain of the heat. In fact, as he narrated the hope within the horizon, lingering between the wisps of sun beams, for the two cowboys in the painting, the sunlight beating down on my skin almost felt reassuring. This man didn’t let his old bones stop him from expressing the childlike enthusiasm within him.
It was only when the cowboys galloped off into the rising sun, ending his poem and performance that I noticed his hands, still shaking. He strode back towards his seat, and I recall one of his friends whispered something about Parkinson’s to him. His response: A shrug, a smile, and the triumphant waving of his crinkled paper in his hands.
“What Is Parkinson’s Disease” Parkinson’s Nebraska, 8 Nov. 2020, parkinsonsnebraska.org/understanding-parkinsons-disease/.
Even at such an old age and with a devastating disease, this man still participated in the things he genuinely loved to do. He didn’t let the pressures of social conformity or the struggles in his life define him, but rather accomplished something that was greater, more meaningful, and more touching. He truly loved poetry, and it seemed to have brought him a source of perpetual joy throughout his lifetime, diminishing the surrounding hardships and negativity.
Before leaving the award ceremony, I briefly congratulated him on his achievements and mentioned how beautiful his poem was. His lips turned back up into his crooked, goofy smile and his eyes into slivers as he thanked me and returned the compliment.
Stories like his are the ones I want to keep alive—the stories of those who find a reason to be bigger than what life tells them to be and stronger than society’s expectations and standards. These stories remind me that even amongst the harsh burn of life, we can discover our own source of hope, beauty, and light. His story reminds me to continue to cultivate the joy out of each moment despite the negativity that may be presented. So, I urge you to find or keep on engaging in the things that fuels your happiness, that relentlessly makes your heart burn with passion, irrespective of social boundaries or inhibitions. Because that thing has the power to make even storms of burning arrows a little more bearable.
