Author's Note

I was in a dark mood in writing this, but this is something out of personal experience.

Shelter

Oh, a visitor. It’s not often we get one like you. Though in recent years. Hmm, I suppose you are being more common nowadays. You are free to roam, of course, try the door behind you, to the right, and left. I wont be far, just waiting here for you to acclimate yourself. You’ll be here a while I’m afraid. I know you have words, but speaking, you can’t, can you? I hope you find your voice. It is possible, we all had to learn after all. But do you want to? I can hear those thoughts, rattling, ever so bright. And we are, in here. We burn bright, but we are held in our little lanterns, shuttled and held in our prisons. And make no mistake, we both are.

You can run, you can hide, heavens above, I know I’ve tried. Thirty years, of stones, barbs, and arrows. Words that cut deep. To judging eyes that dare look on with pity, to those seeing you as weak, an easy target no one defends. They will cut you when you aren’t looking. And back in here you will be. It is, if one thing, safe in here. Just mind the shadows, after all. You are young however, and the shadows will not be long. Not yet, but they build, and you will remember in time, the actions. I know, as you will, and in part you do. You hear it in my voice. That distance, that pain. We endure, child. We endure. Because the world does not want us. We are different than them. But I have held enough of your time here, and proper introductions are in store.

I would bid you welcome, from a prison there in I call home. A tour of course, I give, not out desire, nor courtesy, but a simple elegance in which seeing the truth enlightens one as the epiphany might. This is not a prison of bars, ties, social bonds. There is an elegance in its simplicity. It is of which every warden may avail himself to achieve, but never able to by the bonds of law he must adhere to.

A prisoner born, life and spirit bound into form mortal, the time set, in and of this we have only guesswork until the final tok, or tick of the clock to announce the final bell. If we are lucky, we may have a final meal. But I hold no illusions on that. No kindness such as that exists. Come now, you have in this step, achieved the choice of making. It matters not in knowing or being aware. Just the same, you, the same as I desires to live. The walls here will always be vivid to you and I, and those that come behind us. Just as they have for those before us. We see, we hear. And the wolves wait out there.

Take a moment to gaze, after all, in these words, your eyes mark me. They carry me, judge me and weigh me with these words with a knowledge of instilled values. The preconceptions, and mutable facts that carry alongside us. All in just being an individual. Take another step forward, and look upon the form and gaze you have. And we can continue this diatribe of denunciation amongst ourselves. At least, for said moment. Because we speak without speaking of the act. As we do for hearing what lies beyond the ken. For which I thank you, because it is a lonely place here, and however brief we may touch in our views. It is a welcome reprieve., Appreciate this silence, however long winded it might be. Should you find your voice, I hope you might nod back one day, in understanding to this conundrum. The font of knowledge to what we are clearer in some fashion.

You are traveling, or have stayed regardless. I do not hear anymore, nor see. But ah, I still sense that which is about. Ah, where might one such as you end up? Hmm, I cannot say, fate falls not in my jurisdiction. You may be rich, you may be poor. Or of gifted means. I may hope, but reality will not oblige us on that matter. Look around you, if you might humor me? Does the sun shine, does the sky flow with the graces of a warm day? Take a minute, and appreciate this bounty, even bleak. For if you are to be like me, you will find those gifts of sight a curse as you see it all. It will burn in, scalding and crackling. It will assault, every flicker, every moment of motion a constant drain on focus and willpower. And it will not end there.

Hear the dulcet tones of music, the souls of everyone about. The passage of time and wind. Everything to screech against you like a rusty nail dragged screaming across glass. Every second, until, back here you will search, and you will find. The gentle caress of fabric, the wind blowing against you, the warm or cool sun. All the little comforts. The simple things no one even thinks of. Little daggers to twist in, to cut, to burn with ice and fire. And the world will laugh. They will think you crazy, as they had me. With these little wonders of half-thought.

With all that is twisted, and all that is wrong. And there is much more, should I peruse it. But simply reflect, that is only the beginning, and your whole life to adapt just with those. Instead I will ask. How might you endure these above, warping, scalding, overwhelming, every second, every day? These shall be your fetters, shackles and chains of base variety. None will know, for if luck should favor you, a voice you might have. But she is far more cruel than kind..

Can you live? Will you live, striving to better yourself? When so much is missing, and I haven’t yet talked about your cruelest warden in this prison. Oh no, we can hardly forget the axis of your very own thoughts, aligned against the norm. You will find a gift of brilliance, even in your prison, locked in this place. But such will not be one shared. No, it will find itself in a singular, a moment that for good or ill will define everything of your love, your happiness. And maybe, perhaps maybe, if you can condition, can break the mind, ever so slight, might expand that love into more. Ah, if only, after all.

By now, I would guess, you have gone. But such is to be expected. They do not wish to see what horrors can afflict those nearby, silent in their plight. There is kindness in ignorance. There is serenity in not knowing. I can only ask, to beg, or plead, that if you are there, to listen further. In donning the brand, with so many wrongs, and worse still, we so often break under this. I ask, that you help those of us that are truly afflicted.

Support us. Help us stand. Give us refuge. Let us blossom. Yes, we are prickly, and difficult. But we are loyal. We are honest. We are kind. And we can laugh, happy, the rarest place we may ever find ourselves in. Is an open happy that balms even the darkest soul. That is perhaps the lament of ages. We can do, we can be. But we can not do such alone. We are broken, incomplete. And we must depend on you. We have no choice. We have no choice. And that perhaps is where I leave this. I return to the dark.

And hope. And pray. That I might have found ground in which those you may yet meet. Can live.