From the Shadows

Is there a set price for atonement? 

A threshold I haven’t yet met? 

Is there a certain price to pay to be allowed to finally forget? 

To forget the ways you say I failed you. 

The way I never quite measured up. 

The way I didn’t fit your mold and that failure became my fault. 

I’ve never claimed to be perfect. 

Perfection is something I knew I could never attain. 

But I fought the fight and went down knowing I tried. 

God knows I tried.

What I didn’t know…..I was trying in vain. 

The impossibility of making someone happy with the false ideal of perfection they wanted to see. 

I was merely present, knowing what you were looking for would never be found in me. 

I’m scarred and batter, I’ve been broken and changed. I’m no longer the person I was. 

I was just a person begging to be seen. Begging to be loved. But that was never enough. 

I can’t carry this expectation, this complete failure at being someone I’m not. The label of unsatisfactory when you didn’t get exactly what you want. 

One thought – one question that turns in my mind. A heaviness I can’t escape. 

Can I ever truly atone for being the runner-up? The one you never wanted to take?