Sticks and Stones...

I hope u choke on those words...
I hope those same words that cut me, cut your pulmonary artery.
I want those same words to get stuck in your trachea and you suffocate, I want you to try to cough them up and they just won't come
I hope they defeat you, leave u weary, beaten and bruised, the same way they attacked me relentlessly
I hope your reckless vernacular erodes away your teeth, so your smile doesn't light up my soul anymore
Maybe those words will forever be engraved on your heart and brand u "damaged goods" as they've done me
I hope they taste bitter and make you too angry to function
I want those damned words to burn your tongue, burn your soul...I hope their indecisive nature will one day make you insecure, scared, lonely, hurt
Those words should echo in your ears and burst your eardrum
And when those words reach your heart, your valves simultaneously open and the blood backs up and you die...
I hope every breath you take gets heavier and heavier from speaking them until you can no longer ventilate
Those words should be like cancer, constantly replicating, until you're consumed by them
They should throw off the homeostasis in your body and negative feedback won't work and all your bodily functions cease.
I hope it becomes a virus, getting into your DNA.
I want those words to affect the rods and cones in your eyes and make you blind, literally and figuratively.
I hope those words kill you as unexpectedly as they did me, and on your death certificate it reads: verbal suicide...

Had I'd Said "no"...

I sat and wondered, then I sat and thought, and finally I just sat in silence...reflecting.

My mind wouldn't let me decide...clouded with questions and uncertainties.

Too many "what if's" to be satisfied

Starting to second guess, and regret.

Confusion settling in, wishing I could change it...

Had I'd said "no", then what?

Maybe my heart could reconcile with my mind and it'd be like it used to be, blissfully ignorant.

if my mouth would've formed that simple phrase my brain tried to signal but curiosity blocked.

Naive, I was surely naive. Now I feel gullible, vulnerable even, walls left unfortified.

Had I'd said "no", maybe my pain wouldn't be so great.

If "no" had been said things could be different.

My heart wouldn't be so empty, my thoughts so muddled, and my feelings so hurt.

I had a choice, it was made and I can't help but think it was wrong, I was wrong, where did I go wrong?

im feelin desperate, needy, clingly even...trying to figure out where right went left.

What if I'd said "no"....why didn't I say "no", how could I'd said "no" ?

I dont know what to do to fix it...had I'd said "no", maybe I'd be ok, I wouldn't be so conflicted ana I could move on...If only I'd say "no"....why cant I say 'no"?

the cup

I went to drink from the cup, it was empty, my heart sank

my mouth was so dry but my soul thrist for the quenching taste of the liquid from that cup I'd seen so many others drink from

I looked all around me and I saw no where to drink, no oasis in this desert, a sandstorm approaching

Putting the cup to my lips once more and yet again met with emptiness...like so many times before, i was gripped by an overwhelming feeling of fear, scared I may never taste the sweet nectar of happiness

Tears of anguish streamed down my forlorn face and evaporated before they could hit the sand.

I looked at that cup, so elaborately carved and engraved with the stories of those before me, thought of the hands that had held it in celebration where my fingers now desperately clasped as if trying to squeeze the life out ot i and...nothing

This cup transformed to a different meaning of the "American Dream", in my hands, the hands of an African descendant and a body made to bear children as it beared many burdens before. Hands that had not written the constitution but picked the cotton out back.

the contents of this cup had been emptied with no regard for the next person's thirst. I journeyed all this way for it's soul aving serenity, the concoction to help me devise a plan, a remedy for the sickness that ravaged wrecklessly within me but it was gone.

So there i lie, I sat, I waited and wondered until I finally mustered my strength to journey in search of my own ingredients for a new mixture. Along the way i mixed m blood, my sweat, and my tears in that cup. zamy anguish, my pain, my hurt, my failures brewed with my hope, my love, my faith, my triumphs....to drink from that cup whose contents had not been intended for me but that which I drank from anyway. The same cup that those before me, facing great adversity, drank from and also arrived t oan empty cup and sought to fill it again.

Now full,, I drank from the cup wehemently this cup not intended for me, a cup that held all i'd ever dreamt to be. And now as I looked at the cup, I saw the story of me, engraved there for the nxt to see...

I left that cup with a sip at the very bottom, hoping the next ; would drink from the cup of success using it for the nourishment of their mind, body, and soul and venture on in search of more...