What You Are

I have paid the price

For being what I am,

I proclaim with pride.

I have withstood icy glances,

Burning words, entombing silences;

Merciless shutting of emotional doors;

Smouldering resentment that flashed cruelly

Like bloodstained swords in battle;

The sharp knives of induced guilt;

The tear bursts of hope denied;

The burden of sorrowful resignation.

But the path of my convictions beckoned,

I set out on the stony road to fulfil

Perhaps in part, the grasping tenacity of my will.

What delusions did I foster in my blind heart?

When did I become oblivious

To the call of need in loving eyes?

I now look around me and see all those

Who have paid the price too –

Not for being what they are

But for my being what I am.