Truth in Numbers

@PoetryofSci

Truth in Numbers
Back home

I was anchored:

To studying

To school

To my parent’s shop counter

Most hours

Of every day

I was working with barely a break

Customers always flowed

and while business rarely slowed

In the confines of our store

I would still steal seconds

To watch our door

That door between our store and so much more

What would it be like,

To step through

To leave this place

To explore?

I had to know—

I had to know more

I see my uncle, the scholarship winner

All my uncles—such macho breadwinners

Confident in their knowledge

As they quizzed and assessed my academic progress

I felt naive, felt like such a beginner

I loved the island

But I couldn’t be silent

I was already stretching past

All my current limits

But leaving the island—

It’s a game of numbers

And me, I’m not one to slumber

I'm willing to gamble and

calculate

the rate

at which I need to

elevate myself enough to

claim

the future

I’m working towards

So I read as I dream and dream as I read

Of where these endless pages will lead

But I'm counting, counting the pages I've read

Each page of each book pouring knowledge in my head

I learn too quick that

Winning my first scholarship

Was just the start

To charting a part

Of my expedition afar and

America isn't what I expect

Even worse, between me and my studies

I feel a disconnect

But I know how to work hard

How to pause and recollect

Mathematics has been my language, numbers have been my words

It’s time to find new phrases, a different dialect

I leave behind the theoretical

And redirect my intellect

I find a way to reconnect

my head and my heart

And what I do best

Eventually

I find myself studying biostatistics

The transition to my new mission

Bridged the past and the present

Gave my voice presence

As I advocated for stronger mathematical education

And learned how to perform data analyzation

Looking back, the heart of my journey

Stayed the same

Even though the destination may have changed

Because with each step I took

In numbers,

I always searched for the truth

From the applications over which I labored

To the fans that never wavered

To the burdens I carried on my shoulders

To this moment—to each brown-eyed gaze, looking up to me

Making me determined to succeed

in walking the stage, in flying free

And I know that when

those that watch come of age

I’ve showed them a doorway

They too can step through

One day

- Maaya Prasad