It Must Be Hard

It must be hard To carry it around That load of hate Weighing on your heart A powder keg Waiting to explode Hurting others but Killing your own soul You pretend it isn’t there But now and again it shows In what you say In what you write The sarcasm hidden under the sweet The hate clothed in happy And yet…. It’s there For the discerning to see It must be hard To have it eat away at you And not be able to voice All those words That are begging to be heard Dying to hit the mark A bull's eye victory That brings relief It must be hard To keep them locked away For fear of criticism Of “losing face” And yet…. They gnaw away at your being Those sugar coated morsels of hate For those inferior Made of fluff Not substantial Not up to par Medicore Weak Sniveling Sappy Sorry Excuses of human beings It must be hard To be civil To pretend to be kind Thinking others are blind To the real motives behind Your words….. Ah…if only you’d realize The only one hurting The only one who is weak Is you To love takes strength To forgive takes power To rejoice with others takes integrity The finer qualities To hate is easy To love near impossible Hate would dissipate If you took some time to realize The person who irks you Who just rubs you the wrong way Maybe has been rubbed the wrong way As a child... Sexually abused Struck down by violence Suffering from... Emotional abuse Sexual abuse Verbal abuse Physical abuse Insecurity Feelings of inferiority He has hidden baggage too Behind his false bravado A heart that is in pain Much like you His brokenness plain His tears in the rain So no one can see I know it must be hard To try to change To put away hate But it’s not too late To look inside The one you despise You just might be surprised To see deep within And there in his eyes A reflection of all that comprises the beauty of YOU! Eileen Manassian Ghali