Reflect.

Growing up is never an easy thing,
words fail as you sew these seams,
of childhood abuse, swept under the rug,
becomes another family story, only given a hug,
touched more than the family pug,
deeper into depression you dug,
is there a light, ..or.. none.

But you lept through, into adult-hood,
where mental illness is romanticized on the evening news,
where the only spotlight shines when a bullet flies,
into many innocent lives, terrorized, even the ones who survive,
their life is changed in just one hour’s time.

And not the good kind of change either,
one that needs more than a deep breather,
a change that makes every generation realize,
that we’re all missing those You’s and I’s,
a community together supporting lives.

Instead of a nation working together no matter the cost,
we end another day, another law tossed,
how many countless lives do we have to exhaust?
before we start comparing this frequent deletion
of the world’s children to the Holocaust, with millions lost.

My friends fear the day,
when someone chooses to say,
that their lives aren’t worth anything,
as bullets continue to spray,
because a childhood strained,
by abuse in other ways,
wasn’t given enough attention,
when it mattered back in the day.

Mental illness is important, respect it with all your might,
because I’m tired of seeing families torn apart,
when avoiding this was always in sight,
so talk to somebody who is troubled and tell them,
it’ll all be alright.