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The Weight
Of The Coat,
The Weight
Of The Heart
always taken from a mother’s womb, making the bond between a
mother and child the strongest in the world.
I grab my bag, the coat tucked under my arm, and walk out the
door, past the rows of tiny houses, with roosters and hens frolicking
along the dirt and stone of the narrow road, the sound of early
morning sweeping reaching my ears.
I reach the village gate. And I step out into the ocean of vast
unknown.
Wang, a childhood friend of mine, greets me grimly. Together, we
climb onto the waiting truck, which soon bumpily speeds away.
We got to watch the sunrise through white bark and branches of
the trees, the light shining upon the fields of rice and corn. It did
nothing to lift our heavy hearts. And I notice, as the truck shudders
over another bump, something in both the pockets of my coat.
In the coat pockets, there was the last of the rice wrapped up in
a red handkerchief, and a precious peach for longevity that she had
intended on having herself, for the sake of her health, that was now
in my clutches.
I cried, grasping the coat, sitting on the truck with thirty or more
sons with equally loving mothers they left behind, awaiting the
sounds of drums and gunfire.
‘
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