There are moments in my life where I awaken from slumber and the shadows of who I once was quickly retake me if only for a moment. There are prices in which we must all pay on order to survive, many of which are in itself their own penance. For those of us who walk among you with hard earned hollow eye which only hint of horrors past, we can probably find moments within our past where we were someone else, someone who once lived with a lighter heart and less weighted burden. Moments like these haunt us, reminding us of who we once were and what we once have been before reaching a certain crossroads where the toll to continue would not weigh upon us until we had already bargained and paid.
These moments haunt us of our own naivety and even a wide eyed trust among those who we believed walked among us with kind hearts and loving minds. We see those fools we were once and we mock our lack of knowledge as if we could have foreseen any such explosion of madness from others so volatile enough to deceive us to believe we were at fault. If approached we would say we abhor the fool, attempting to distance ourselves from such idiocy. And yet, if allowed respite and a silent moment to hide from the harsh eyes of a cruel world, we would all fall to our knees and embrace longingly and lovingly a version of ourselves torn asunder why a miscalculated action of trust.
This night is one of these as I look up what I was so many years ago, decades ago at a fool who loved poetry, believe that good would vanquish the dark sullen night, and everyone has some redemptive source of good within. Such a Romantic lad, who uttered verse in order to understand rhythm and bounce of words believing that everything can be expressed and that if given enough time he would woo the world with a song of love, a moment of contemplation, and a ballad of great ones who committed themselves upon Herculean feats. That his will as his carefully chosen words could convey any emotion and thought and would never fail him as long as he had breath within and dreamed of worlds that limits were only that of his own foreseen limitations.
I look upon that boy, so trusting and innocent wondering how he could have survived in such a place. Where his trust among everyone only allowed cruel and conniving to make mark of him. Where those who were made lame by others for whatever reason would take hold of him and also remove from him what they lacked since they could not inspire love. It is easier to mock and ridicule those who attempt to make their place in the world a bit kinder and colorful rather then take such an impossible task of making life better for all. Those who were crippled before cripple, not out of immense cruelty but simply committing a repeat horror to justify their own loss as something that must be. Hollow and cruel spawn others to wallow in self hatred and abandoned hope rather then protect those who have what they too lost within.
Emotional undead tearing away life from those who still hold it dear, increasing their ranks and creating a colder world.
And few of us who survive, even torn apart refuse to partake such acts. We hold dear the belief that such a cycle of hatred and anguish must end within ourselves. We attempt to express our loss with the same talent we had to convey beauty as a honk of pain escapes from each of us than the song of love. A wretched sound that catches us unguarded and within horror as a bird flops downwards with broken wing, still making attempts to return to skys wide and glorious. We fear our deaths, yet we learn that death would be merciful. We are forced to walk if not crawl on grounds unfit for our bodies. We were once creatures of the heavens, marveled at our majesty.
So we, grounded creatures walk among creatures more suited to live on lands not of our own and we either perish from the disadvantage or we evolve into cruel things with sinister means under the guise of survival. We walk among the miserable life of ground, to hunt or flee. To leave deep and heavy tracks or to offer fear to those who would seek us as an easy meal. We find sanctuary in lethal methods and numbing lies to believe we were always suited for such a life. That we were never to soar but to struggle on cold earth.
We survive and create a broken and harsh world among ourselves. We flock to each other to display wounds and sing song of our wretched battles. In our weaker moments, under medicinal vice we break down in weeping woes and lost bird song we all once sang. Such glorious yet dooms songs that once lifted spirits only to remind what cruel the world is to force us to ground. The weaker of us choose their end and those of us suffering from madness become creature to rip those asunder, hating ourselves for being torn once.
We ask you not for your woe nor pity. We can not be reached in any such manner. Yet, if given a small moment to sing our bird song, we shall if only to hear it once more ourselves. At times our song attracts our kind who do whatever available to return us to their flock. They find us and give us what we could only wish for. We can not understand such gifts and we let them go sallow without return. Many leave. Broken ones stay to be among us in our broken states until they to become us or return to the skys in fearful shock. We are abandoned and we see not how we force other to when we secretly cry our songs for love and aid.
I see myself once more and I remember poetry. I remember art and music and lively boisterous joy. I remember a childe which once reveled among close friends and loved ones and not one who forces all away. I see a fool by my standards and a time lost within my grasp. I see innocence unsullied and a heart open to anyone who wishes to share such a gift.
I walked his footsteps. I remembered him for a song bird once more. I reminisced of whole healthy wings strong enough to life my hurt body into skys. I remember song never mocked and love given freely. I was bird once, not creature of harsh land. I was one who sang to those left below and yearned for their return. I loved freely, openly and shamelessly. I wanted nothing then to sing my song with many and to life the hearts of all.
I say this part of me. I felt my wings whole and strong. I rose up high if only for a moment before landing harshly in denial. I was not who I was then Nor will I ever be. I lived too much to return to such a virgin state. Yet, can I not learn to fly again? To sing a different song? To find meaning in words lost. To write poetry once more. To scream to the heavens and earth that I am once more free from weights and tethers? To be who I was, yet stronger?
Could I heal? Could I love? Could I not find purpose? Could I not use what was given to me to rise up and raise all once more? Would the hurt prevent me once more? Would the fear of those in their own anguish keep me down? Could I not attempt to even if I fear this moment and believe that I will only be torn once more?
I loved poetry. And museums. And art. And film. And running in hand with someone I wanted near in these moments. Warm kisses in cold air. Loving smiles and promises of pleasant nights. Of happy moments that would never end in waking night terrors. Kind moments. Close companions and a celebration of life through art?
Did I abandon it or it me?
And as it once taken me by shock of memory rediscovered, I lost the warm feeling to cold emptiness. To yearn for what is now an echo. I miss that moment.
And yet, I chanced. I walked within beauty in search for what was. I trusted those among me with an abandonment I once was known for. I shared in joy and gave love if only to have it once again echo within a state of loss and sadness. I held on if only to rediscover who I was. I have an echo, yet it may be enough to offer hope.
I once loved poetry.
I once more seek it's song.
I once more hum a song lost.
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