Peace

You don't have to know what to say. You don't have to understand. But you do have to make words. Use your words.

When I was younger, my parents would always remind me to use my words. And through my growing up years I've heard that phrase echoed many a time.
But what happens when you don't know how to make words? What happens when you feel so much inside of you that there are no words?

I sat in the library this morning next to a boy who's in my biology class. My thoughts were going off in so many different directions and I felt completely broken.
"Are you ok?" He asked me. I looked up from my text book, the one I hadn't really been reading. He was watching me, with his big brown eyes.
"I don't know how to do this..." I said, meaning more than just the biology work set out before me.
"I know," He replied.
And somehow it wasn't the wrong thing to say.
He watched me for another minute before turning back to his own work and I stared at the clock and counted down the minutes.

There's this thing they call survivor's guilt. It's found in people who have survived a traumatic event, such as combat, natural disasters, epidemics and suicides.
The inside of my left wrist has seen far too many names in the past little while. Names of those I know who have died. People who died while I survived.
Right now the black ink has been rubbed off because of the bracelets I was wearing this morning, but the letters can still be made out.
Peace

My own broken heart has been beating rapidly all day, pounding against the inside of my chest. I am reminded of the journey I am continually walking, one I don't understand, one that is breaking me in so many ways.
I am so tired. I can barely find the strength in me to lift my head, to keep fighting, to keep this broken heart beating.
And there are moments, when you slip into bed at the end of a long day, or standing before a rising purple sun after hearing news like the kind I got this morning, and you think "How long can I keep doing this?"

My own broken heart beat a little faster today, as her little broken heart ceased to sustain life. Under the rising sun I fell to my knees because this isn't something I understand. My heart is heavy and full of things I can't yet make sense of, and it slams against the inside of my chest reminding me of this little one who's heart is whole now, a little one who is connected to me, from one broken heart to another.

I am broken. I am worn. I am tired of fighting this battle and I am tired of losing and I'm just plain tired. I can barely find it in me to hold myself up. I don't understand.
And even in all of this...
Peace