The Storm

It is not the storm that we fear.
It is the aftermath of what remains.
The devastation and carnage left behind.
The worst of storms are the ones that no one else ever sees.
The ones that happen in our hearts and in our minds.
The ones that seem to last an eternity.
Ripping away at our confidence and tearing apart our hopes and dreams.
Leaving behind just a shadow of who we were.
Caused by love, fear, doubt, or hate.
These storms manage to wreck the foundation of what we believe.
But as with any storm, what is left behind is in the eye of the individual.
We can look around and see the debris of our lives scattered about.
We can fall to our knees and clutch the pieces to out chest and weep.
Or we can look up to a sky no longer filled with darkness and despair.
We can look to a sky of clarity and promise.
Those who will suffer through more storms in fear will be the ones who weep and those who defy the next storm and take the relentless beating with a smile are the ones who will turn to the sky.

Tonight I Lay Alone

Tonight I lay alone but it doesn’t mean I’m in the presence of loneliness.
You’re with me…
Inside me…
Near me…
I cannot touch you but I feel you.
I close my eyes and anxiously wait for sleep because when I wake up it will be one day closer to being with you.

Bound

Here I stay incapable of moving, incapable of leaving.
Incapable of having my own thoughts and incapable of feeling what you won’t allow allow me to feel.
I am bound to you through chains forged from denial and self-benevolence.
Bound to you through ties spun of insecurity and cowardice.
Bound to you with committed acts contrived of iniquities and malice.
I cannot break free and I cannot say with all honesty that I want to be free.
I know not what life has for me now that I’ve dedicated what life I had to you.
I’ve separated my needs and wants from that of your desires.
I’ve poured myself willingly into your glass to drink from and have asked nothing in return.
I am bound to the silence in which my voice of regret echoes.
I am bound to this existence because it is here where I have purpose.
I am bound to misery for she is my only company and I am bound to suffer for it is the price of your love.

How Can You Truly Love….

How can you love someone that you truly do not know?

I ask you this because the love you have for me is bewildering.

You say you love me and I first doubted the words you would speak.

I had heard those words spoken by others but with no sentiments attached.

You continued to say them to me in spite of my affliction towards them and you.

I fought so hard to not let your words penetrate my heart and my soul.

I fought so hard to not believe or feel the tenderness in your actions.

How could you love me when you didn’t know me?

You had no idea as to the child I was or the man I had become.

You were clueless as to the dire childhood I had endured.

You were blind to the callus man that I had evolved into.

I desperately tried to ward off your attempts at knowing who I was.

I did this for the sake of you and for the sake of sparrng you.

It is a fool’s errand to attempt to love one uncapable of being loved.

Uncapable of returning the love that one so pure can afford.

But you continued to tell me both night and day.

And when your words were not enough, your actions spoke louder.

You reached into my chest and held my heart in your hands.

You spoke into my ear and let your voice reverberate in my brain.

You pulled me close and let your essence soak into my skin.

You did what you could to prove your love was real.

But still I ask how can you love someone you do not truly know?

Maybe it is I who does not truly know myself.

Maybe you have seen me for the man I hoped I could be.

The man I feared I could never achieve being.

A man capable of love and of being loved.

But how can I love you if I do not know myself?

How can I love love you if I cant love who I am?

You are far more deserving than to have this weight to bare.

You are what love would be if it took form on earth.

How can I love you if I truly do not know who I am?

I can only hope to know who I am by seeing myself through your eyes.

Through your eyes I will find the man I want to be and the one you need.

The man you love will be the man I will become.

Thank you for loving the man I never knew and the one you’ve grown to know.