Right after the bitter, freezing
winter of 1958,
Spring—long awaited, long prayed for—
Was stolen by an uninvited force.
The CCP came crashing in like a
falling mountain,
Crushing lives, scattering families,
Leaving survival as the only choice.
A teenage boy, heart pounding like a
trapped bird,
Surrendered everything he knew.
Staying was no longer living—
So, with only a flicker of hope
And a few trembling words,
He waved a final goodbye to his
family,
Not knowing if he would ever see them
again.
The path he took had no name,
And no one would willingly follow it.
Every step demanded a piece of life,
And a price of dreams.
He climbed and slipped, rose and bled
For months across the world’s highest
range.
Then—like a whispered blessing—
A new world appeared, bright with
music and laughter.
To him, it was nirvana, a miracle
earned
After years of silent prayer.
But not all reached the other side.
Some vanished into white, unmerciful
crevasses,
And only a few emerged, carrying
wounds
Too deep for any doctor to see.
It was mid-summer in Kathmandu,
A city of temples and incense.
After weeks lost in pain and fever,
He finally surfaced back into
consciousness—
Back into life—
Feeling again the weight and wonder of
being alive.
Yet the journey was far from over.
Learning a new culture was another
mountain,
A new language, the steepest climb of
all.
Perhaps fate sits above logic, as
elders say,
For, who would have imagined
A shepherd boy renting a tiny
apartment in New York City?
The sky and the changing seasons
Were the only familiar things in this
foreign world.
Still, fate softened, offering him a
soulmate—
A woman who, like him,
Had once left everything behind.
With gestures, smiles, and patient
silence,
They built a life together,
Leaning on neighbors when English
failed,
Even just to understand the mail.
But the scars of 1959 still burn
beneath their skin.
It chills them to see CCP leaders
Standing beside world leaders—
A reminder of the darkness they fled.
Even when they don’t know the
politics,
Hope trembles inside them:
A longing to see family again,
Just once more.
A decade passed, and a new purpose
arrived—
Their daughter.
She became their renewed strength,
Their reason to rise, to try, to
learn.
Perhaps one day their English
Will be enough to share their story—
Their truth—
When she stands tall as a Tibetan
American,
In her community, and on the world
stage.
For her future, they drown their
trauma.
For her dreams, they keep moving,
Though they still live without a place
To truly call home.
Still here, beneath a foreign moon.
Still here, holding onto the last
thread of hope.
Still here—
Waiting for a brighter dawn.
