Poems & Perceptions
Sage burns in dank dark corners, my mind is set alight
Flickering, sparking, glowing; long into the night.
Sage speaks to me in wisdoms my ancestors got right,
Bold and brave philosophers, self-aware rational fight.
Sage smoulders in polluted air, it cleanses now I breathe,
Fragrant smoke it whispers, no more choking,
‘Arise my suffering knees.’
© Michelle Sotiriou 2019
Gods of war lost their manners ripping worlds apart,
Shameful, stood there watching mothers crippled dreams way from the start,
Guilty of walking past, the tears that burn the streets,
Why do you pick up the pace of ignorance?
Why don’t you slow down?
Why don’t you stop?
Why don’t you please ask?
Remove your mask…
Blades they bleed of grief not glory.
End of story.
© Michelle Sotiriou 2019
It’s not a life I would go back to, growing up as a Greek Cypriot teenager, but I would go there one last time just to look at the magazine cuttings of George Michael on my bedroom wall. My life back then was a stifling existence without any clear window to the freedom I craved or to open so I could escape.
For many of the girls in my strict situation, there were pop stars and those pop stars meant we could escape in our minds when our feet were too paralyzed with fear to move. In fact, the only defiant and rebellious thing I ever did was to leave marks on my very on trend at the time pink and grey wallpaper after re-applying sticky tape which would lose its grip eventually and cause George to fall and hide behind my bed post!
I just wish I could have gone to the Wham! Farewell Concert, which of course, I wasn’t allowed to go to, but, I followed my gut instinct and with endeavour I can now listen to him whenever I want and wherever I want. I unbolted that double glazed window, installed cheaply by the council to find my FAITH, FREEDOM and I am in no doubt that George ‘The Singing Greek’ found his heaven.
© Michelle Sotiriou 2016
So you think you’re ugly? Most of us do at some point in our lives and it seems age doesn’t really matter when you feel this way which is why I was guided to this video. A video which reminded me how I felt as a girl and adolescent. I could never take a compliment, could never look someone in the eye when they paid me one, didn’t believe them when they told me I was pretty and would always reply by saying, “No I’m not”.
The struggles of a Greek girl were real though! The mono-brow I wasn’t allowed to pluck and a hairy top lip, ginger in appearance after my cousins introduced me to bleaching; what a stunner!
The struggle still goes on but it is a little different. When a medical problem challenges you by changing the way you look even slightly, you have to find once more, the confidence to say ‘thank you’ after a compliment which you know deep inside to be honest and true.
I recently became the proud owner of a wonky eye, this is what I call it because I have to turn every hurdle into a joke and find that self-deprecation is my only medicine. It’s a coping mechanism which my friends and family know all too well. Luckily, I know my worth, wonky eye or no wonky eye I can still see out of it which is all that really matters and I am well past worrying about what others see when they look at me. What other people think of me is their business, not mine.
© Michelle Sotiriou 2015
She Be Fierce 