The Backpacks They Carry

(I wrote this a month ago at a moment when I was overwhelmed by the emotional weight that students walk around with each day.) 

Backpacks and locker keys,

Pelts from last night’s thrashing,

Young love and heartache,

Betrayal’s knife that leaves a mark, a friendship scarred,

And a relationship broken.

Unfinished essays and tattered textbooks,

Letters never sent, stored within,

Miscommunication left hanging, will it ever clear?

Missed expectations with no clue how to make it right,

Severed heartstrings with no idea how to retie them.

Jokes in back pocket and sarcasm saved up,

Reaction after reaction after reaction

Poured out after days, months, years of disapproval

Received in lashes, phrases, silence, distance.

The things they carry,

I feel them, too.

The things they hold onto,

I feel them, too.

The tension that drenches the air

Like a player’s sweat after suicide drills ordered by Coach.

The hopeless that sways the steady marcher to and fro

Without real clarity on how to regain what has been lost.

Years of memories who can erase,

Hours of tears that no one could face,

“How can you change it?” They may ask;

“How do you expect it to be any different?”

She screams.

I will hold the hand that trembles,

But I cannot hold the heart that aches,

Hope will be restored,

These are the days of restitution,

Pain will fall like scales from a dead dragon,

The war has been fought,

You were bought with a price,

These are the moments of reconciliation.

There has not been a ceasefire, but One has stood in the way,

The bullets of your shame, your tainted name,

Have been renewed, claimed, traded-in:

"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,

    because the Lord has anointed me

    to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,

    to proclaim freedom for the captives

    and release from darkness for the prisoners,[a]

2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor

    and the day of vengeance of our God,

to comfort all who mourn,

3     and provide for those who grieve in Zion—

to bestow on them a crown of beauty

    instead of ashes,

the oil of joy

    instead of mourning,

and a garment of praise

    instead of a spirit of despair.

They will be called oaks of righteousness,

    a planting of the Lord

    for the display of his splendor.

4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins

    and restore the places long devastated;

they will renew the ruined cities

    that have been devastated for generations.

5 Strangers will shepherd your flocks;

    foreigners will work your fields and vineyards.

6 And you will be called priests of the Lord,

    you will be named ministers of our God.

You will feed on the wealth of nations,

    and in their riches you will boast.

7 Instead of your shame

    you will receive a double portion,

and instead of disgrace

    you will rejoice in your inheritance.

And so you will inherit a double portion in your land,

    and everlasting joy will be yours.

8 “For I, the Lord, love justice;

    I hate robbery and wrongdoing.

In my faithfulness I will reward my people

    and make an everlasting covenant with them.

9 Their descendants will be known among the nations

    and their offspring among the peoples.

All who see them will acknowledge

    that they are a people the Lord has blessed.”

10 I delight greatly in the Lord;

    my soul rejoices in my God.

For he has clothed me with garments of salvation

    and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness,

as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest,

    and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.

11 For as the soil makes the sprout come up

    and a garden causes seeds to grow,

so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness

    and praise spring up before all nations."

--Isaiah 61