My Life is a Box

My life is a life in a box

Everything I own fits in a box

Every family member has a box.

I live in a box, sometimes out of a box.

Everything can be folded, just so

So everything has a proper place to go

All my things fit neatly one by one

New things replace the old stuff with which you’re done

There’s a master-box called ‘Life’ with a shiny red button

It’s the trigger that’s activated all of a sudden

And wham! The world springs into motion

Moving from hill to plain or ocean to ocean

Everything wrapped up in paper or plastic

Fit in its box, defying all logic

Nothing of life as we knew it remains

The four walls, once a house, now nothing’s the same

My room, the bookcase, bar, cupboards along

We move on and on and on and on

When I was young, I thought this was it

This was what every family did

Come home one day, the boxes are out

It never ends, all the moving about.

Eventually I guessed that it’s not a norm

Not too many others move on and on

So many times from one place to the next

That houses are static, I’d never have guessed.

I’d taken a flight before my peers did

I’d seen more new schools than any other kid

Somewhere in each new school I found

A familiar face from my past around

Every old friend was still different to me

We all changed, place to place, do you see?

Every new school was a chance to start fresh

Who you were from class to class was anyone’s guess

The nerd from 4D was the jock of the year

In 7A that shy chick from 3C appeared

But holy crap, she’s popular now

And how can you like THAT 10B cow?

Oh everyone changes from class to class

Like scenes from a movie, nothing much lasts

Your best friend with whom you played in the dirt

Now is the player with the mini-skirt.

That guy you always thought was a geek

Is now the one all hot girls seek

And you, the observer, from next to the wall

Don’t assume you haven’t changed at all

You’ll eventually all meet up once more

In a world where Facebook can even the score

And “Oh my God, you’re so different!” is the standard hello

From people who once you claimed to know

The Pandora’s box of your life the opens up

And reminds you that you’re still stuck

Amidst boxes.

Boxes with neat school-based labels on

Boxes with multiple names scribbled on

And some with no name that you’re scared to touch

For fear they might reminds you of too much

Every box opens into a wonderful world

In the past when you were a littler girl

And the boxes weren’t quite so very many

Neither were they ever quite so heavy

As life begins to become more multi-hued

Your boxes increase in number too

And when people talk of some vague ‘baggage’

You actually have it, in physical luggage!

You’re capable of lording it over

Any rummaging, kleptomaniac hoarder

And eventually, in the chapter for the life you led

There’ll be a list of box-contents instead