My name is survival
when I did not want to
falling on my face
life had taken everything
yet, somehow in the dust
my heart whispered, "Go on."
As a ghost I went on
for my duty was survival
wandering as the dust
as dirty as I dared to
my shadow covered everything
I hardly knew my own face.
The awful truth to face
I must trudge on
despite the emptiness of everything
choosing the chilling train of survival
longing to lay my head down when I need to
memories decay into dust.
Streaming sun illuminates the dust
a clingy child rests upon my knee
we have arrived, but what camp have we come to?
Hard faces with hard guns command, "Go on!"
A grateful prisoner exclaims, "We've survived!"
when they'll take our hope, our everything.
These dirty, stinky strangers become my everything
tears etched like trails in the dust
remind us there must be a reason we have survived
when they cry I will drop to my knees
and pin their dreams back on
they are the suffering my soul listens to.
The skinny children I give my food to
I have no pity for the fat guards who eat everything
we play games so that laughter lives on
dreams once bright now settle into dust
children hide behind me, trembling on their knees
some ancient memory of maternal survival.
The stars fell slowly, leaving naught but dust
lost in reverence on my knees
for my name is survival.
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