I hold my heart in my hand.
Is scarred from self harm in the past.
And still bleeding from the fresh ones.
At one point it was sewn together by relationship. Only to have that chunk ripped out for good when that relationship ended.
I'm on my knees.
Crying.
"What's wrong?" A stranger asks, and I simply show them my heart.
"Oh, that." They say dinifitively, "You just have to learn to grow up. Welcome to adulthood." They walk away and I look around on the street on my knees. Now in everyone I see is a broken heart. Smashed to an emotionless pulp by expectations. Shattered by anger. Sliced to pieces by deceit, cruelty and adandonment.
Grow Up, they said.
Is this what it means to grow up?
To walk around with a shattered soul and a broken heart, and pretend nothing is wrong?
Is this adulthood?
To crack and cut and cauterize the hearts of others who suffer just because everyone else is too?
Does the fact that other people feel my pain mean mine isn't real?
Is this what it means to be a parent?
To find someone whose missing parts fill each other's, not to make a whole new heart, but instead to have at least one enough to survive on for both of you? To watch your child with a full heart get cracked for the first time at a friend's betrayal, a first breakup, their first 'F'?
Is this love?
To see that vulnerable heart in need of love and support crack and break because the child needs to learn to "Grow Up"?
Is this life?
I was going to make this a comic.
But drawing is for children.
And art isn't a real job for an adult.
