By Felecia Jacks
June 18, 2025 | Unwritten & Understood
Author’s Note: In a world where approval often dictates worth, many of us become like children tugging at a toy—desperate to hear its song, seeking reassurance in its melody.
That’s called emotional conditioning.
This poem explores the silent struggle of constantly striving for validation, even when it’s broken or elusive.
Through the metaphor of a toy that once sang, it reveals the human tendency to persist—to pull harder—and to hope endlessly for a flicker of light amid the noise and silence of unmet expectations.
The Toy That Once Sang
You probably remember the times you felt it—
The sweeter goosebumps of approval.
Two hands come together and make a tap.
You’d found the string
that made the machine sing.
You wanted a lullaby in encore.
But sometimes the string stuck.
Not because it was broken—
Maybe you just didn’t pull hard enough.
So you learned:
Pull harder.
Even when you didn’t want to.
Even when your chest throbbed.
And on the days the toy stayed silent,
something behind your bones began to rot.
In the quiet,
your face surrendered to gravity
a little more each day.
Until it couldn’t rise above water
without the noise.
So you pulled that string
harder,
louder,
more often than not—
just to see a flicker of light.
The one at the end of an endless tunnel.
A light just out of reach,
but bright enough to keep you hoping.
The ocean between you and the glow
carries what crashes with the weight of all your collapses.
Each wave a memory
of the string that once worked.
And how you never really figured out
what made it sing.
Still,
You keep pulling.
Because a performance with no applause
is easier
than walking away from a toy
that once made music.
Even if it’s broken
more times than not.
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