In the End
When I was a kid
I thought that all the people in this world were good
I thought that trust was a valid moral
and that it was okay to believe in others
it wasn’t really a big deal to me
one day at school
I had kicked a girl after she kept making fun of me
I came home and my dad was there
the teacher must have called him and told him what I did
he took me in the bedroom and took off his belt
I didn’t really know what he was about to do to me
so I kept watching
he told me to turn towards the wall
and then he started hitting my thighs up to my back with the belt
over and over
I didn’t know what he was doing
I thought he loved me
I didn’t want to tell my mom what had happened
I was afraid she would take his side
a few days later I got called into the counselor’s office
and a really nice woman asked me all kinds of questions
about my life at home
I wasn’t a kid that lied too often
so I told her
I told her that my daddy had hit me with a belt
and I watched the woman’s face turn to stone
when I got home that day
there was a different lady sitting at the table with my parents
my mom was crying
I was removed from the house
and I don’t know what happened to mommy and daddy
because I never saw them again
and I’m not the only one
who grew up surrounded by that old rhyme
about sticks and stones
as if a tangible bruise or a scar
hurt more than the names we got called
or the abstract bruises and scars that we feel
we grew up with the mindset that things would never get better
no matter how many times you hear those three words
it gets better
it doesn’t
until you decide that you want to make it better for yourself
we grew up believing that the earth wasn’t meant to hold us
because we got called worthless and useless and a waste
don’t tell me that those words hurt less than a bruise or a scar
we grew up searching for outlets to numb the pain
because it had no escape
so we found those habits and cravings that made us feel empty
and for a while
just for a while
the hurt evaporated
I was seven years old
when I was taken to a new school because I lived with a new family
when I got called monkey for the first time
I didn’t know I looked like a monkey
until I repeatedly and constantly called that name
and that name stuck
the school halls were a battlefield
where I found myself rehearsing the act of running away
from the kids and the rumors and the names
and in the end
despite my new family
and regardless of how many times they say those three words
I love you
they don’t
they won’t until I decide to believe them
and I won’t
despite the rise in maturity that my classmates face
I am a broken branch
that started therapy and became hooked on the drugs that they prescribed me
hooked on the names they called me
hooked on the knowledge that one day
this will all be over
and in the end
kids are still being called names
retard
fat
and if a kid let’s go and breaks
it’s silence to the other kids ears
because we grew up believing that suicide
meant weakness and selfishness
we grew up telling the freaks those three words
get over it
as if depression can be remedied
as if depression can be healed
in the end
it’s time to build a cast around our hearts
and to remember those names they called us
to remember the hurt we felt
but to someway
somehow
forgive the past
they were wrong
maybe you weren’t meant to be in a click
maybe they adopted me for a reason unknown
but regardless
there is a reason
they were wrong
in the end
our lives will only continue to be a balancing act
that has less to do with destruction
and more to do with joy.
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