Robes before Stars
I know you. I’ve seen you before, long before – but I remember your face, your kind, soft, innocent face. I remember you from years ago, when you were a happy child, long before this time came to pass. You were happy, gleeful beyond what you were prophesied to become. Beautiful. Perfect. But slowly you received a spot. A small, black spot- placed right over your heart. At first it was nothing, you thought nothing of it. One black spot, one small black spec, in the midst of your glorious robes of white. You would have let it go unnoticed. You would have. They wouldn’t. No, they saw the spec on your robes, and instead of addressing their own pollutions, their own corruptions, their own pain, they focused on your short comings, your inadequacies, your pain and abandonment. For it was easier for them to focus on you than themselves. The more they pointed out your black spec, it began to grow. Daily and daily it grew, day upon day, inching it’s radius ever further across your heart. Beginning to spread, the black spec transformed and transcended itself from a spec to a spot, a spot to a mark, a mark to a stain, and a stain changing the once pristine robes you once wore into a tainted, gray scaled black, tattered robe.
You wore this robe as a badge, a Scarlett Letter. Not across your heart or chest, no – that would be too succinct. Your pain had to scream itself out to the world until there was not a soul within it’s influence that had not heard its song. The robe became your identity, the robe your only being. You pain your identity, the sound of the fabric brushing against itself your voice and song. All the while you wore your sackcloth and ash, trying to mourn away the loss and hurt, the others came to your side, but they were of no good will. No, they came to your side for the sole purpose of pushing you down. They only lifted you up on their shoulders for a moment, simply to make the fall to the ground all the more dramatically painful. They were no Samaritan to your cause, and you knew this. But you were desperate- desperate for the hope of a friend. Willing to stretch out your hand to the unlikeliest of friends or foes, never knowing or considering they would eventually turn their kissing smile into a biting, betraying kiss.
I know- I knew you. I saw you long before, long before all this ever happened. I’ve seen you all. No, you are not alone. There are thousands upon millions that wear the black, tattered robes. Few still have their robe still without at least one mark. But only those where the mark has personified the person is the damage so fatiguing, so damaging and desolating. Millions feel as you do, all with different reasons under the robe. Each one asks the same question: “Why me?” I’m sure you’ve asked this question as well. Whether whispering the phrase quietly to yourself in the night for a sense of comfort or screaming it to the sky in hopes of an answer. But the skies have no answer to give, for the answer was already given yet forgotten.
Why you? Why were you given this burden? Why were you the one with the broken family? The dead sibling? The mirror that never seems to act up to expectation? The daily visitation session with wolves masquerading as friends tearing away at your soul? The mental instability? The razor that seems to have red stains that cannot be washed away with water or time? The gun that is loaded and unloaded each night before you lay down before the very mirror you despise? The bottle of pills piled ten stories high, all with a unique tale to tell? The noose that has been tied around into a knot a thousand times over? Why YOU! Why! Why were you given this burden? Because you are the one made strong enough to survive. You were the strength that others saw and sought to weaken. The unstoppable force coupled with a will to press on that terrified them into making you less of a power. You were made to be great, and they saw this- so they tried and will continue to try and defeat you- to tear you down with words before you see your true potential. That is why I am here. To show you. Look at all of this! See what you have seen, come against, and still breathe after which. Yes, you may have desired the breath to cease, but you pressed on because you were stronger than the very thing the others thought you would fall to- depression. Words were their weapon, but a beautiful heart and will was your defense. They hadn’t a chance.
I know, this may not be over. In fact, I promise it will continue. But the beauty of the situation is, when you have reached the worst it could be, the only position you are left is upward. You see, they are fools. They think that by pushing you down that you will not amount to anything, that you will be too broken, too shattered. Sometimes they win, if one stays wallowing In pity and pain, but those that are pushed to the bottom-they are the grandest of us all. For when they were forced to the bottom, they could only look to the sky. They saw the moon reflecting the light from the sun and aspired to do the same. They picked themselves up, put on their tattered robe with pride and soared beyond what they could have ever imagined. This is you. This is what you will become.
So, why you? Because you are being made into something to rise and be a light grander and higher than anyone would have permitted. Pick up your tattered robe, look at far you have fallen, and proceed to soar. The other stars have already cleared a spot.