Sincerely October

To the better days ahead

A hopeful chapter.

Roots that run deep
Those roots run deep, we all see that the poison tree doesn't grow towards the sun quite like the flowers do.
You aren't wilting, you aren't anything but big, bright, and green, but you will rot and cave in until you pull the roots that hold you.
The winter came when you were young, it was cold and dark and you thought you'd never see the meadow lit by the sun, but the snow melted.
The sunshine was exactly what you needed to know that the winter was over.
You aren't what you used to be. You know this to be true because you survived and you didn't think you would.
You know the worst is over.
Many moments you feel the snow again, you see it so vividly that you are consumed by the intricate patterns of the falling snowflakes, but the winter is over now.
Sometimes you feel your leaves gasping for air as if the winter is choking you, but the winter is over now.
The forest is beautiful, for so long the roots that helped you stay tethered to the ground kept you sick, and you never told.
How could the woodland creatures help you if they couldn't see the pain you grew from?
You thought you would always be this way, this was all you knew and all you'd ever know, or so you told yourself.
One day the water soaked into the ground and you realized that long after the winter ended it would kill you.
You didn't want this to leave you rotting but as the water sunk deeper into the earth you knew that you will be honest or your branches will fall and your insides will hollow.
So you told your story, you let the wind blow in any direction it needed to and anyone who could listen heard.
You thought the sun would never rise if people knew,  the world would grow colder and dark then it ever had been, but now you know otherwise.

Post traumatic all night long
It's on nights like tonight I feel truly broken.
I'm a mess and it's pouring out of me.
I want to sleep but maybe that's not how this goes tonight.
I fall asleep for a short while and feel myself choking again, I wake up as if he was right here right now.
I fall asleep and see him standing next to me or hovering over me and it hurts like it used to.
I can see him above me.
I fall asleep, I become terrified, and the cycle repeats.
My roommate leaves for the couch because he wants to sleep tonight and I can't help with that.
I feel alone at that moment. I want to be better but I'm not quite there yet.
I fall asleep again.
"Get off me" "Stop touching me"  "No don't do this"
I want to tape myself back up but it's proven to be difficult.
The way people look at me hurts.
They know what happened to me, I don't have to tell them because they already know.
I haven't learned to live with this quite yet.

In bloom
I'm still a very terrified individual.
It seems that when you look at me at my core I am a scared child who doesn't want to get hurt again.
But I am not who I used to be.
It may rain some days but I can feel the sun on my skin.
I don't have to run anymore.
I thought I'd always be running.

Goodwill hunting
It was not your fault.
I didn't try to stop it.
I became a statue when I realized what was happening.
I didn't scream or cry or try to get those hands off of me.
It was not your fault.
I was drunk.
I should have known better.
I shouldn't have been there in the first place.
It was not your fault.
I didn't realize what was happening to me.
I was too young to know the words for it.
It was not your fault.
I kept it a secret.
I haven't told anyone.
I should have tried harder.
It was not your fault.
I'm still in pieces over it.
It was my own flesh and blood.
Sometimes it feels like it's going to kill me.
Sometimes I can put it away.
It was not your fault.
I build my walls high, I keep my distance.
I feel fragile, I am moments away from falling apart.
I can't think about it, I don't want anything to do with it.
I tell my story to anyone who will listen.
It's not your fault.
It happened years ago.
It happened days ago.
It's still happening.
It is not your fault.
You didn't know better.
Wounds heal at different paces.
You were not asking for it.