(no subject)

[geekchick]

Found in comments in matociquala's journal, in her post linking to this wonderful post by yuki_onna. Go read at least that last link, I'll wait.

...


After the Pyre, Li-Young Lee
(from Behind My Eyes)

It turns out, what keeps you alive
as a child at mid-century
following your parents from burning
village to cities on fire to a country at war
with itself and anyone
who looks like you,

what allows you to pass through smoke,
through armed mobs singing the merits of a new regime, tooth for a tooth,
liberation by purification, and global
dissemination of the love of jealous gods,
coup d'etat, coup de grace, and the cooing of mothers
and doves and screaming men
and children caught in the pyre's updraft,

what keeps you safe even among your own,
the numb, the haunted, the maimed, the barely alive,

tricks you learned to become invisible,
escapes you perfected, playing dead, playing
stupid, playing blind, deaf, weak, strong,
playing girl, playing boy, playing native, foreign,
in love, out of love, playing crazy, sane, holy, debauched,

playing scared, playing brave, happy, sad, asleep, awake,
playing interested, playing bored, playing broken,
playing "Fine, I'm just fine," it turns out,

. .

now that you're older
at the beginning of a new century,
what kept you alive
all those years keeps you from living.

Comments

[brian1789.livejournal.com]

Ouch. That's a zinger... for me, much of the past five years has been spent unlearning or turning-down the once-survival-skills that were keeping me apart from others. Thanks for helping me to crash those old walls.

And may I hold your hand? (soft smile)

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

for me, much of the past five years has been spent unlearning or turning-down the once-survival-skills that were keeping me apart from others.

And you've been doing a really good job, there, beloved, of being brave and opening to new trusts.

[just-the-ash.livejournal.com]

This absolutely resonates for me. Completely, totally, for reasons we've talked about and reasons we haven't yet -- but living with the Ex taught me paranoia, the art of not completely revealing oneself, the art of the double life, the cover story, looking innocent but not being that way. Needless to say, I'm sick of that shit.

You can has hug whenever.

[grum]

Ow, ow, ow.
Yes, me too. I've been there. I'm still there. There are people who care and want to see what I really think. Who don't just want to be told whatever it is that they want to hear. Who want to actually see me.
It's a hard lesson, but living is worth it. I'm tired of simply going through the motions. Though at the moment I'm also tired of doing the work to build myself new models. Blessedly some of them are firmly enough in place that autopilot uses them instead of the old ones. It's worth it.