Number-one bestselling author
Sadness is difficult.
It creeps up on me
so that by the time
I find it living within me,
it is a surprise
to find it there.
I glare at it,
trying to give it the look,
but it is impervious.
I yell at it,
throw things at it,
tell sadness that it is not wanted,
but still it stays.
Soon, it fills my head,
beginning with a rain
that drips down
throughout my body,
until I am heavy
with sadness and unshed tears.
I look at myself in the mirror
and there is a wetness to my eyes.
Sadness talks to me in a sly voice
that shines like gasoline
when it has dripped into water,
so pretty but so lethal.
It whispers in my head
and it says things like
“You know that no one loves you” or
“It’s impossible to change the world, why do you try?” or
“It would be easier just to end it.”
This is not my first dance with sadness.
I look at it,
I take sadness in,
shining like a rainbow
but I know that the sheen is fake.
I know that if I dip my fingers
into the puddle that contains the rainbow
it will disappear
and leave only the smell of something
that burns my nostrils.
Instead,
I look for my own light
that hides beneath the sheen.
I can see it dancing behind the rain.
Reaching into the gasoline rainbow,
sadness looks overjoyed,
but that look changes
when it sees what I’ve grabbed hold of.
Pulled out of the wet sadness,
I hold my light,
a mere grain of sand in my palm.
However, it is not the size of the light
but the brightness it shines with.
I clutch that grain of light
and I know that,
with time,
it will be a sea of light
that will welcome me home.