Hope
is a fickle thing.
A master in the craft of deals,
it leaves us thinking in extremes.
To build a fortress
or a crumbling castle,
to be all in
or fold,
to make it all
or nothing.

Once invested in our hopes,
expectations become the badges we wear,
telling ourselves the “truth”,
whether it really is or not.

We become hooked on the allure
of what it must be,
forgetting that life gives us more
than only one possibility.
The wise words of reality
begin to evaporate from our minds,
replaced only with
what we want to see and hear.

At first, the beauty will be in the gardens.
The aroma of petals
tease your sense of smell,
teasing your sense of sight.
The warm sunlight coaxes out
smiles and laughter,
creating a cloud covering
the storm on the horizon.
Expectations are high
for a winter with no snow.

Days are gone about
in hopeful optimism,
lulled into the hands of ignorance,
believing the violent winds
are only a mere breeze.

When winds become roars
and the sun is no more,
the glamour of our imagined paradise
begins to fade.
Our eyes become clearer to
the swaying trees,
the shattered flowerpots,
the clogged storm drains.
A closer look would have told you
the secrets of the gardens.
Wilted and rotted from the stem to the leaves,
a sweet aroma is released
when it is time to take its leave.
A step beyond the reaches of the parasol would have told you
of the arrival of the season of snowflakes.

Relying too much on our expectations,
we sat idly, watching the signs pass us by,
waiting for reality to dampen the mood.
Only then, we muster the courage
and take the time to realize and distinguish
what could be with
what should be.

---

This entry was inspired by the enchanting film, La La Land, where we follow two characters, Mia (Emma Stone) and Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), who have the desire to pursue their dreams. With Mia wanting to become an actress, and Sebastian wanting to save the jazz scene, they both find each other and support each other in their pursuit of fulfillment.

We are led to believe that these two have a healthy relationship and have the ability to become the dream couple, through many activities that display their companionship. However, as Sebastian is on tour, achieving his dream, that left Mia alone and essentially neglected. During the dinner scene, words are exchanged, and they are forced to face the truth of their relationship.

Although they seemed to be a fit for each other initially, their lives began to diverge as their careers developed, and as a result, they could no longer be in a state of “hopeful optimism”, and their “eyes [became] clearer” to the reality that they were not meant to be together.

Through this experience, I wanted to relate it to the ways in which our hope does not equate to our reality, and at some point, our hopes can only take us so far until our reality comes and “dampens the mood”. In some instances, we rely so much on our hopes, it “leaves us thinking in extremes”. And predictably, when it doesn’t work out the way we envisioned it, we come crashing down. Even though there were clear signs that our hopes were unobtainable, we pushed that thought out of our minds, believing if we turn a blind eye to it, it won’t happen. But of course, that is not true. And instead of only seeing “what we want to see and hear”, we are inevitably forced to accept the truth, however painful that may be.