I’m Still Here, And I Will Shake You

"I’m Still Here, And I Will Shake You" I’ve walked roads you wouldn’t whisper about. Where shadows don’t follow, they lead. Where the air tastes like sorrow and the silence presses like a loaded gun against your temple at 3 a.m. The dirt remembers me. It groans where I nearly gave up, where the weight of my own breath felt like betrayal. You want real? Not the filtered bull. The kind that pulses behind your ribs when you can't lie to yourself anymore. Then sit down. Shut up. And feel this, not with your ears, but with your scars. You think you know me because you saw a smile once. But you’ve never touched the nights I bled through with clenched fists and cracked prayers. You think walking means peace? Try dragging hell on your spine and still showing up like the sky doesn’t have claws. I’ve dined with my demons. Heard them whisper my name like a lullaby laced in gasoline. And I still got up. Still laced my boots. Still faced the day like it owed me an answer. I’m not your redemption arc. Not your "look how far he's come" bull. Not a trophy for your temporary empathy. I’m the storm they tried to drown in a teacup of shame. I’m the rebel who didn’t ask for your approval before tearing the mask off your comfort. You sat in your clean certainty, while I was knee-deep in broken promises, asking the moon why it never stayed. Begging the morning to stop lying. But pain doesn’t spare the ones who suffer quietly. I stayed. You hear me? I ing stayed. When disappearing felt holy. When silence became seductive. I stayed. Not to make you feel better. Not to fit your hero story. But to spit in the face of a system that profits on our surrender. Now you clap? Where the were you when my reflection turned its back on me? Don’t call me brave like it’s a sticker for surviving. This wasn’t bravery. This was instinct. This was rage in my lungs when I chose to breathe anyway. I’m not here to be palatable. Not here to hug the hands that held me under. I am the howl that rose from the wreckage you buried. The match that lit itself when no one else dared to try. The sacred, savage scream of— No. More. I’m here to be loud. To punch holes in the walls you built with silence. To make the earth remember my name with every ing step I take. I’m still standing. Still unbroken. Still wild in a world that begged me to kneel. And if that shakes you? Good. It means I’ve finally become what you never had the guts to be. Lev