Tethered to nothing but a wish and a dream

Floating in unsettling gravity

Grappling for a branch or twig to grasp onto

A mere ledge to hold you afloat

In this life there are but few certainties

You will be born into a world of instability

Haunted by fears that infect your decent soul

Festering like a canker sore

Swelling with anxiety

Throbbing with the dull pain of confusion

This thing called life isn’t for the weak or feeble

Life is a beast with an armory of weapons

Weapons that aren’t designed to draw blood or glide through flesh like a subway train

Life’s artillery strips away the very essence of you

Peeling back layer after layer of your soul like an onion about to be chopped into a winter stew

Over time you don’t even recognize the layers you lost.

You glare at yourself in the mirror and see a person you don’t know.

A creation whose existence you missed being created.

Who is this person that peers back at you?

This being with the hollow eyes and flat-line smile

This being with the glow of a bat’s cave

Dark, Dim, and Gloomy

Face strained by the pressures of life’s heavy demand.

Your soul, a faint whisper of the bullhorn it used to be.

You beg

You yearn

You pray

To be that person you use to be

Burden-less and free

With as many cares and worries as the eagle soaring above the sea.

But how do you get back?

Once your shoulders are stacked with cinderblocks

Let me tell you how

Close your eyes

Think about a place

A time

When your shine rivaled that bright star hanging above high

Do you have it?

Do you see it?

Is it in your mind’s eye beckoning that smile to reemerge on your languid face?

You see that person radiating with joy, glee and confidence?
Now, hold onto it and feel your soul rise from the ashes like a Phoenix

Be the you

You were destined to be

The you

You were born to be

For that’s the person immune to the beast of life.