With Love, For Damage

Our little lives feel so consuming,

Yet I’ve spent just as much time,

if not more,

in others’ shoes.

That man on the side of the street?

I imagine I am him,

struggling to sell flowers to pay rent and bring home food for three small children.

I see the ghosts of my own life there,

know first hand the crushing weight of a failure that feels impending yet must be avoided for there is no other choice!

I have no money to give,

yet wonder if i could,

would it be the difference between another meal and an uprooting?

I wonder how much hardship these people have faced already,

wonder what number is tacked to the front of this specific battle.

I grieve the fact that I am unable to help,

unable to simply procure enough for all of us separately to exist without struggle.

Meanwhile there are new rivers of blood being dug and flooded in the streets,

New rivers that flow with dismal promises of the future,

that promise with the quiet whisper behind it that though I have yet to live I will never get that opportunity unless I fight, tooth and nail for it.

Fight to the brink of death and back for a life I had not previously wanted,

selfishly tried to throw away.

Not my own selfishness.

I bear no blame.

The blame lies within the people that should have instilled the hope necessary to feel alive,

Should have reached out a hand instead of stomping cruelly my own small one with heavy boots intended to leave lasting damage.

I will live a masquerade,

but I will live.

I love,

I am loved,

and I find that I am damaged.

Even so, fear will not consume me.

I will prevail.

As always.

Not in spite of my damage,

But with love for it,

For there are no other options.