A Letter To...

To The Lost One,

We have a fascinating relationship, you and I. For years I have stood by struggling to read you. To comprehend you. To get through to you.

I watch in silent horror as you leap impulsively from each metaphorical cliff. Battered, bruised and bewildered at the bottom, you are somehow genuinely surprised by the resulting catastrophe.

I shake my head in disbelief as you trudge stubbornly down the same disastrous path time and time again, seemingly oblivious to what lies at the end, even though you have forged this road more times than either one of us can count.

I pick you up, dust you off, let you cry out your frustrations on my shoulder. I tell you what you need to hear, and you seem to listen. Your tear stroked face and puffy eyes stare back at me. You blow that reddened nose and nod your resolve.

I breathe out. I begin to trust that you have learned from the mistake this time. Next time you promise us both it will be different, and momentarily it seems you have us both fooled... until you find yourself on that well worn trail once more, plodding towards inevitable destruction.

And it is destruction. I have watched your face change over the years. Your skin loosening and sagging, forming ridges where the strain has pulled too often. Your hair, framing a bowed head, falls wilted and lifeless. Your muscles seem atrophied and wasted with resignation, as if all strength has melted away like ice cream in the sun. But worst of all are your eyes. Those once light filled jewels now the vacant windows of a long abandoned house.

I recoil as you allow that mouth that once brought pleasure to strike you down, once again. Another tiny fragment of you chips away with each blow until in time you will be nothing more than an empty glass shattered across the large expanse of white tiles. Irreparable.

I can't allow that to happen.

I still remember the laughing girl who sold painted shells from her balcony and thought life was a grand adventure. I can't stand by and watch any more of her die.

I'm writing to tell you it's time to change.

I won't be fooled by your shamed yet reluctant words from the base of the cliff.

I will not allow you to make a promise to us both that you will soon discard.

You can try to recall and submit evidence of the fatalistic patterns of childhood. Deflect responsibility onto those who, although the cause, never became lost or trapped in those looped memories. But it will not work this time.

I will not soften, for my resolve is simple.

I will save you. I will save us.

So that one day I will be able to look into this mirror and see a flicker of lighted movement behind those darkened windows, as the girl with the painted shells comes home once more.


From
The One Who Has Found The Brushes