Understanding

I was raised to understand
That nothing pure can last.
It fades away and begins to decay
As each breath becomes the past.

The summer of my childhood
Was plagued by a bitter drought,
And the grass withered beneath my feet;
My family’s fields grew nothing
But loneliness and doubts.
I carried water to fix the dry, cracked earth—
It was cupped in my tiny hands,
As I prayed to every single god
I couldn’t understand.

But no rain fell,
It never healed the land
And I’m left with dying lonely things
And gods I will never understand.