Pick Up Your Shackles

November 2, 2015

I am the shadow of the person I used to be, still happy and involved,

Sullen eyes and weary

Walking along like the dead

Who would expect me to be where I am now?

“The world is your oyster, how could you complain about the way your life is?”

“Think of the kids in Africa, and South America, and India.”

“What could be so wrong with your life when so much goes so right for you?”

They don’t understand, no one can really comprehend

The grief that these eyes have seen

The words that I have heard:

Threats of violence and self-harm, Complaints of life

I am not wronged, I haven’t contemplated to be or not to be

I am happy and free

However I still know and see

Others who aren’t so lucky

Slaves of their icons

Slaves of the media

Slaves of their self-images

Can you hear the shackles now?

This isn’t a violent slavery

But slavery it still is

There will be no gang violence

No mass shootings erupt

Because we have chosen to take up the chains ourselves

We MUST do this because that’s what everyone else does

Why?

Why must everyone be the same?

Why can’t people be who they are?

But it won’t happen

Not with the society we have today

Where everyone cares about plastic celebrities

Instead of real people

Instead of the people we actually will meet

We picked up our shackles with no second thought

Pressuring others to join in with them

That’s not what I want, not what I crave

But here I am

Me being me

And that’s all I can ask to be

Shackle-free

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