XXXX

To my beautiful XXXX,

You, who doesn’t believe that anxiety is real,

You, who belittles my thoughts and concerns about the world as naivety,

You, who I care for so much but I’m beginning to feel distance from,

You, with your pain that is so great, with your past that is so dark,

You, who says my world is too small and that I need to learn humility,

You, who despite all our years together doesn’t understand my mind.

I get it, my clever XXXX,

You’ve lived a hard life, made terrible, gruesome choices to survive,

Your choices haunt you, it’s blatant in the way your eyes cloud over often,

Their once shining gaze, glazed over with pain.

Your burdened smile sobering even further with thoughts I cannot fathom,

A world I cannot follow you into. No, will not follow you into.

When we met, you were a healthy sixteen-year-old,

Armed with a careless smile, soft words and gentle eyes,

And of course, your long unruly curly hair, a trademark of your multiracial genetics.

That all went in the years since we’ve known each other,

Even your trademark hair is now cut short,

Perhaps a symbolic gesture to rid yourself of the hold the past has on you.

Most probably a way to reimagine yourself, rediscover yourself,

Before the repulsive, cancerous root of an ex led his predatory gaze on you,

Before you were dragged into womanhood by vile men who took and took,

Before your emotionally abusive and unavailable parents became physically unavailable,

Before you lost your house, family, youth, education and security in one fell swoop,

Before you made that choice that has left an irremovable scar on your body, soul and spirit,

Before you became cold, and harsh, before my experiences became a nuisance to you.

My strong XXXX,

Understand this is not an attack on you,

It is not a list of how you did me wrong, for I know your heart,

Despite the battery and the hurt is still pure indeed.

I understand that I do not understand your struggle,

That I do not see the gaping dark abyss in you, impossible to fill.

But I have my own. Mine are buried so deep, I sometimes forget they are there,

Till they rear their ugly, evil heads, and I’m left in a dark corner of a dark room,

Utterly numb. I know you’ve travelled the world and meet people from all corners,

You experienced and lived things I haven’t, and now you think big, huge, global.

But spare a thought for your lonesome friend here,

Spare a thought for my upbringing which was just as harsh as yours with any glamour,

Spare a thought for the restrictions on me which means I cannot travel the world like you,

Spare a thought for my expectations which you class as unrealistic,

But forget the sacrifices and loss I had to endure to even have those expectations.

Spare a thought for the words that required bravery to be spoken that you discard as normal, “Everyone thinks like that.”, you say; but kept me awake at night.

The words rattling in my head, solidifying their cruel, bitter hold on me.

Lastly, spare a thought for my anxiety, the one you dismissed as fantasy,

But is the only reason that I’m here, drafting this to you.

My beautiful, clever, strong XXXX, my lifelong friend, help me bridge this distance.