CHINA TORI

Tell me,
What heals the human heart
Like the therapy of kindness?
Small acts of love capable
Of giving second chances.

I know people are heavy with history
But if we let love lead,
We can still quarantine selfishness
In our different spheres.

Sometimes, no words are required
Just the teeny-tiny effort of stepping
Out of our own heads.
Thereafter, we are blessed with
The knowledge that a little light
Has been shed
On a once dark life;
One that was confused, sad
And almost giving up.

Many struggle with the awful
Companion called anxiety.
For years, it follows them around
Like a shadow and from them
It takes away normalcy.

For people who have no idea
What it is like,
It is often very hard for them to understand.
They ask you to pull yourself
Out of it,
But they do not know
It is not as easy as it seems.

Surrounded by people, yet all alone,
I was trapped in a world
Where hate and chaos ruled.
I laughed and smiled sometimes,
But those moments never seemed to last
Because I was constantly haunted
By memories of things that never were
And sometimes by a past
I do not want to remember.

In my head I ran distances,
Screamed for help and tried to talk
But no one ever heard me.
No one saw and no one understood.
So unable to distinguish what was real
From what was not, I often wondered
Why joy always came a day late.

Wait, now that I think of it,
I wonder what people saw
When they looked at me –
A strong, happy, willful, spontaneous woman
Or a scared little girl
Who was afraid of the dark
And even more afraid to grow up.

Definitely, they were deceived
By my big smiles
And so couldn’t see the tears
I fought so hard to keep inside.

For God’s sake, why were some people
Quick to mock me
When the source of my pain
Was something their eyes could not see.

How can one judge how far
Someone else has come when
They do not know where they started.

Oh, how many oceans should we sail
Before we remember harbor?
I mean, how much do we need
To own before we can give –
Before we can remember to be kind.

On its knees the world begs for a little light
And we are all made of it.
There’s enough of it in us
To see the masked tears of loved ones
And hear the silent screams of strangers.

A little kindness
Is all it will take, I tell you
And kindness is not always
In the big things.
Kindness is sometimes
A smile, a call or a text.
Kindness is listening;
No judgments.
It is giving of your substance;
No expectations.
Kindness is lending a hand,
Saying a prayer and sometimes,
A warm hug.

I knew I was ready
that day in May
To give up and give in
I was tired of the pain,
Rhe confusion, the emptiness
And the hope
So I decided to end it all
But I was saved by a call.