Survive;
Survivor;
Survived.
What does it mean?
Is it what they survived?
Or what we survived?
What I survived?
That’s definable – the ‘what’;
Danger, violence, terror.
The suffocating distress of it.
But what does surviving look like?
Is it still being alive?
Is it still carrying on?
Is it reaching the top?
Or screaming ‘Screw you!’
in triumphant reclamation of self?
And anyway, who really decides?
Who says we have achieved it,
– earned the badge of “survivor”?
Surely, only we ourselves decide.
Some of us need to learn survival;
we are here, alive, despite it all,
despite what happened to us.
But we’re not truly there yet,
you know – in Survivorville.
Wherever the hell that is.
Where our recovery, healing,
growth and thriving reside.
Survivorville, the city
of those who feel strong,
whole and free, once more.
I am alive, breathing;
trudging onwards and
trying to find the path.
But in hidden away, in
the drawers of my
tired, chaotic mind,
I am undeserving.
I am not worthy,
nor complete enough
to earn the badge
“SURVIVOR”
just yet.
Photo by Andriyko Podilnyk on Unsplash
