reading room
Should I?
Should I wake with leaden breath, a dawn I did not choose? Should I taste life’s bitter cup, though knowing I might lose? Should I smile when no one’s there, and walk with steady shoes? Should I live, when silence whispers I could just as well refuse?
Should I grip the brittle thread that holds me to the sky? Should I count the clouds for meaning as I drift on by? Should I brace for joy or storms, not knowing which is nigh? Should I ask if choosing life is nothing more than just a lie?
Should I walk a path unworn by those who never fake? Should I build my house on sand, then watch it quake? Should I laugh when pain arrives, or tremble when I ache? Should I search for meaning deeper than the shadows beneath the lake? Should I vanish— and in vanishing, unwind the threads they tied to me? Would I end the ache, or start it— just not mine to see? If not for guilt, or love they gave, would I already be free? Should I name this effort noble, not for some grand plan? Should I see it all as theatre, and still speak each line? Should I raise my eyes to nothing, and call that nothing mine? Should I hold this breath—a moment more— and take it as a sign?
Should I tell myself I’m strong— not by fire, but by choice? Should I let the world move through me, still and without voice? Should I shape my grief in language, not for them, but to make noise? Should I dare to stay and stagger, not for hope, but for the poise?
Should I scream into a pillow just to hear a sound? Would it echo back an answer, or just prove I’m still around? If the world holds weightless meaning, must I still be duty-bound? Should I hold the hand of time, though it drags me through the mire? Should I find a light in motion, not in ends I might desire? Should I live not for the living, but so none must light my pyre? Should I find in quiet effort the ashes of a fire? Should I then conclude with this— life need not blaze bright— Should I walk not for glory, but simply to still the night? Should I stumble, should I stutter, should I fail to find the right—
Still remain— Not for light— Not for me— But for their sake… Silently.
For even in shadowed silence, I am here—quietly alive.
— Lilith