Her hair is straight and long,
black as ebony, lips are pink
but she isn’t quite Snow White.
Her skin is tanned and her face has spots,
she isn’t that tall and she doesn’t have any curves
At all.
However, much like Snow White, they both share
A common taste in clothes,
shoes,
favourite things,
and a difficult, struggling life.
Like Snow White, she wears this
Tattered and Torn
And ugly and mismatched
outfit that said,
“HEY! I’m the biggest dork in the world!”
because she can’t afford nicer clothes. But they are warm and comfortable,
just perfect.
Just like Snow White, she is kind and sweet
She is full of respect and care for others
And never wished bad luck upon those
Who are more fortunate than her.
Maybe a little difference between them was that
Snow White was a princess; she’s just a peasant
Born to a family of nine.
Snow White knew manners, but she does not.
How could she? She is just a humble, simple woman from the poor villages
Homes under leafy roofs in Southern Myanmar.
She tries to learn, oh yes she does,
And I even taught her not to dig
her nose when I spoke to her,
or raise her voice but rather
be just gentle and soft, like the breeze blowing over
the grass in a sunlit meadow, soft and sweet, soft and sweet.
One night, when I was just casually talking to her
It led to me and my little brother
We went to take a look
At how she lived, in a three storey block
Just across from mine
But what a surprise, I couldn’t believe what I saw!
My legs were curled in, hands over my knees I sit
On the bed with its hard wood, just a thin mat
Simply lying over it.
When you sleep, wouldn’t you knock against it?
How painful and uncomfortable it must be, sleeping on
A board and nothing more.
I wonder if she ever had a decent sleep,
A blanket to curl in when the rain beats down,
A form of warmth and comfort to shield from the striking hand
Of life that torments us every second?
She also had some friends
But small ones, they were, and grey and small
With whiskers on the faces and cheekily as they were,
They hide among the trash her roommate dumped at the door,
Just like on the ceiling, webs fluttering when a breeze rolls in,
Because tiny spiders have made it their home.
Squeaks from those hidden corners,
Mysterious movements we can’t see
I ask her if she’s okay with all these pests, but she just shrugs and says,
“Meh. I don’t mind them.”
I wouldn’t be able to sleep.
The room is small,
So low and narrow,
Barely with space to breathe.
Or move about, or change!
Just stuck in the sullen room,
No space, no space, no space.
It’s just a place where you sleep (uncomfortably, with no sheets)
And suffer through the night when the wind bites you with their icy teeth.
I ask her, “What’s your name?”
She tells me it’s May Thu and I nod.
May Thu doesn’t have much.
All her possessions could easily slide into
The smallest of all the backpacks
And yet you’d have space to squeeze me in, too.
Toothbrushes, soap. A broken mirror and a hairbrush.
Some clothes and that’s all she has.
And yet, she’s happy and I realise
There’s no end to people’s greed. It’s something you have to
Put ******* in to widen it, so that you can dump a whole lot of
Material desires, and maybe two elephants,
Just so you could satisfy its perennial hunger.
It’d be hungry by the next hour.
When May Thu starts telling me stories about her brothers
And sisters
And goes through each of their names,
Her eyes glisten and a tinge of red, just slightly washes over
Her white eyeballs and her nose twitches,
With the smallest sign of reminiscence.
Her parents are pretty old, and they’ve got nine children to support.
But they’ve got older kids who can take care of themselves, but
With a gaping hole in their wallets, who’d mend it and fill it with money?
Only the kids, but it’s hard, May Thu says, and I can feel her throat tense,
she feels that lump you get when you want to cry,
but your throat hurts and it’s simply too dry.
May Thu wishes and yearns of a day
Just once, if she could, just once
Be rich for once and know the feeling-
being free of all duties.
May Thu is sad, a storm cloud has settled onto
Her troubled mind.
An idea swims up to me and whispers as May Thu says,
“I like checkered shirts.”
The idea winks and whispers that,
Maybe it’s time I give a little gift.
I grab my green flannel shirt, so big and so warm
Fashionable and comfy. Just right.
“There you go!” I tell May Thu
She looks at me with grateful eyes,
And seems to sing inside her mind,
May you be well, happy and at ease.
Thank you for making me life a little more complete!
When it’s time to leave,
I can’t bear to go. But the last I saw of May Thu was a happy smile
And I can feel it in my heart, the warm and the sweet.
I’m ever so grateful of whatever I have, and don’t spend my money
On nonsense I don’t need.
I’ve learnt that I didn’t need anything anymore.
I already have them, in front of my eyes, and they were all free!
All these things I’ve learnt, are from someone special.
You taught me that I didn’t need a swimming pool
when I have the River  Right  In  Front  Of  Me.