What Now?

When the loneliness and fear invades

And I am too weak to care for myself

When I stand back to view the woman curled fetal

And hate everything I see about her

How do I survive?

She sits there now

A person once so strong and life-filled

Now an indiscernible wreck; dependent on others

Turning to the bottle to forget

But first has to travel the road to remembering

How does she survive?

When I want someone to take care of me

If only the focus for a night

But cannot pursue that evening of reprieve

Without sacrificing my pride

I’m not one to accept one-time use

Built to first require trust and connection

How do I survive nowadays with those demands?

It’s on those days and weeks

I’m reminded that right now

There is little value in a person so broken

Fragile enough that a single comment or joke

Can unlease months of self-doubt and reminders stowed away

How do I survive under these feelings of worthlessness?

I ask who do I still trust?

I ask why do I still share?

I ask how did I fail so badly

The one I loved wholeheartedly

To arrive here in the first place?

I ask what is so wrong with me?

I ask where do I go now?

I’ve told myself that I will establish no timeline

That I do not need to search but rather remain open to being found

But I am searching; to survive I must find comfort and reprieve

I must find the feeling again of being valuable to another

Something easy enough to tell myself, but so hard to believe.

Each of you have soothed your conscience with rehearsed words

At the expense of the weakest one here

A memorial service provided you “closure”

But did nothing to soothe the agony for the one

That stood by him even when that grown man looked at her

And in pain said “I don’t want you”

She stayed, though lashed out in frustration at times

Loved him; Helped him; Sacrificed for him. 

You have returned to your routines

You have continued to pursue your happiness and pleasures

You have declared yourself at peace

Night after night I have sat mostly forgotten but bathed in empty promises.

I am incapable of focus, unable to multitask, strained to remember the most recent past

I challenge myself and if I succeed it still leaves me exhausted as never before

I obviously lack discernment

I ask for honesty and have done nothing but give the same

In that I repeatedly opened myself up to silence and hurt I cannot handle.

Perhaps the road I go now is to continue the path I’ve been on before

With Abandonment the only companion at my side

Perhaps now I recognize that I have just two choices

To thrive alone or to die falling short in my attempt

I don’t know what tomorrow brings

Let alone the next day, month, or years

I was just trying to survive one day at a time

To grasp happiness when it appeared to me by surprise

I don’t know when the fog will lift

When discernment and focus and passion will return

I don’t know whether opportunities even await

Or when more pain and disappointment will be introduced.

I wish to simply be in control

But I can control no one’s thoughts or actions

He’d still be here if I could

I’d have replaced memories a decade long of saving others

And longer of feeling as a bargaining chip and not a son

I’d have captured the hauntings and tortures of his mind

And replaced them with calm: with a warm beach and peaceful water

We were going to physically share it together

A reprieve from the demons

A promise never kept and memories lost forever.

It’s time to shut my mind to others

It’s time to retreat to a distance

It’s time to busy myself to provide excuses

To pretend that I’m occupying my time

With (empty) events in the presence of strangers

And to mitigate the time left to a churning mind

Obsessed in my thoughts

“Why wasn’t I enough?”

“Why am I not enough?”

It’s time to remove honesty from my tongue

It wasn't wanted in the first place.

Perhaps then I regain control

Over a life that has been long void of just such.