It’s midnight now and I’m laying next to you in bed listening as your breathing slows, sleep overcoming your attempts to stay awake. I hate this time of night because it means I can’t talk to you, calling out because I saw, heard, or thought something I can’t keep to myself. I can’t be with you in your dreams, experiencing events together. I hate it because I miss you.
Goodnight my love, goodnight.
I arrived broken.
Alone, scared, evanescent, identityless.
I was a middle-aged child who had been homeless between four walls.
I was emotionless and empty, not knowing, or caring, if I was alive.
I wondered, if my car stalled on the tracks with a train hurling towards it, would I get out?
I had lived in a world of ugliness and filth, with all exits blocked.
I could look at the sky and see nothing but a cold, stark shell, unaware I existed.
Full of life, joy, love, and belonging.
I know my place, I know my role.
I know myself.
I’ve seen places that took away my breath and laughed until I couldn’t breathe.
When I look up, the sky isn’t bleak, it’s a universe of wonder, waiting to be examined.
The scars are still there, but I don’t mind.
They remind me where I came from, and show me who I am.
It’s me, I’m alive.
Here I come.
