Thursday, January 9, 2025

The Raven

 




The Raven

 

            It feels like I’m dying

            It’s in my chest, the withering feeling

            I think it’s my soul

            It sinks further daily

            It’s a darkness pulling, yanking, dragging

            My heart doesn’t dance often anymore

            It races; panicked

            My mind races; panicked

            It feels like I’m dying

            Like my soul is drowning

            I search constantly for ways to save it

            That’s what we do, right?

            Survive?

            Tread water, force ourselves to the surface, gasp for air?

            I’ve watched people do it

            Survive heartbreak and trauma and devastation far worse than mine

            It can be done

            I keep searching

 

            I tell myself this is just another test

            Of my strength

            I’ve had this test before and survived

            I had another very similar test many years ago

            Where I lost the life I thought I had and was forced to replace the lies

                With a truth

            I was broken, but I survived

            We all find ways to survive

                 Lies

                    Betrayal

 

            I took my dad to lunch the other day

            I watch how frail he has become with age

            He walks with a cane

            But his shirts are starched and his jeans are pressed with a seam down each leg

            His eyes search the ground with each step

            Fear of falling or tripping

            His sight is failing him

            His mind remains strong

            He moves slowly but keeps moving

            He lost his wife two years ago

            He’s lonely

            But his shirts are starched, and his jeans are pressed

            He keeps moving

            Into the final days of his life

                 Surviving

 

            There was a raven that often came to my yard day after day

            A black bird

            An omen I think

            “I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will fall frozen dead from a bough                         without ever having felt sorry for itself.”

            That is a favorite line from a poem

            I have inked on my arm

            I love the sentiment

            I need to send this message to my soul over and over again

            My soul is not really dying

            I am simply drowning myself in self-pity


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