face my ghosts

nobody’s perfect
nobody’s all bad
nobody’s all good
and nobody knows
what it’s like to live in
somebody else’s skin.

I’d like to understand why people did the things they did
I’d like to know what was going on in their heads
and their hearts
but the only thing I know for sure is that
I’m the last in a long line of lousy childhoods.

people tell me
why can’t you just get over it
which really means
why can’t you just forget about it
but they don’t understand that
forgetting is not a solution
because what is left forgotten
is left unhealed.

they don’t understand that
I have to find all the pieces of myself
that were shattered over the years
and lie scattered on the road to forgiveness.

they don’t understand that
I have to face my ghosts
so I don’t pass them on to someone else
like someone else
passed them on to me.

I have to face my ghosts
I have to find them
I have to name them
I have to know them
I have to set them free.

(PDF version)

The face my ghosts by Rick Belden, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.