THROUGH THE CRACKS

 

Falling through the cracks

We enter the in-between

Sounds quite harmless, really

Till you understand what that means

 

Into another world

Of platitudes and meaningless phrases

Sinking to depths unknown

Empty words and shallow faces

 

He hangs his head as she exits

She “didn’t sign up for this”

Thirty years of love and affection

But the burden destroyed the bliss

 

She comes home from her job exhausted

Retirement is only a dream,

Wishes her children would help her

But can’t expect them to “drop everything”

 

Her friends ask her out to the game

She is young and wants to have fun

But her symptoms confine her to home

She weeps, all alone, comes undone

 

He needs to provide for his loved ones

But he can’t hold a job in this state

Questions his worth as a man

Feels he’s sealed his family’s fate

 

His daughter is labeled “complex”

So, he endlessly searches for care

Spends his time and all his life’s savings

In search of answers that are not there

 

She once was an avid runner

Now imprisoned in her bed

Full of emotional turmoil

Sobs while wishing for death

 

Mentally and physically spent

Grieves the loss of her normal life

Reaches for a bottle of pills

And hopes she does not survive

 

When you look below the surface

Just beneath the others’ feet

Where the fallen long for mercy

For a life that was once complete

 

Where instead they are met with disdain

Apathy or indifference at best

Where the others bestow their judgment

As contempt drips from their breath

 

Where “chin up” and “it’ll get better”

Roll off their tongues like honey

In the land above the pavement

Forever bright and sunny

 

Where lives and houses are empty

Careers and relationships long gone

With psyches and bodies unraveled

Those words sound a bitter tone

 

It isn’t as easy as willing

As wishing or trying one’s best

On the underside of the sidewalk

Life is an utter mess

 

We’ve used every tool in our toolbox

Bartered and begged and pled

Taken all the advice that was offered

Listened to everything that was said

 

But instead of wine and roses

Acceptance and healing and peace

We stumbled into darkness and struggle

No tenderness and no release

 

Believing themselves invincible

The others scoff at the lessers’ fate

But they fail to acknowledge the lesson:

No one escapes life unscathed

 

So, appreciate the topside

But understand your place

One slip or misstep or cruel tumble

And you, too, may fall from grace

 

Might find yourself slipping through cracks

As you enter the in-between

That place you once thought so harmless

But now grasp what it all really means