Wish we didn't need
A month for Black History
Or the LGBTQ+ community.
Observing
Throughout the year
Sober vigil days
Against the horrors
Committed against humanity:
January 27th
Holocaust Remembrance Day.
November 20th
Day of Transgender Remembrance.
Remembering/honouring
Those people killed/tortured
For being different.
Except we've forgotten
Human rights struggle
Never ends.
Segregating
Arbitrary based reasons
Defining one's value
By race religion sexual
Or gender orientation.
In demonizing people
Justifying barbaric inhumane
Acts of hate
Through crimes of power.
I say this
Having personally experienced
How hate and intolerance
Scars one's soul.
To the point
One’s fight for life
Becomes a race
To the death.
Using self-harming
And self-medicating
As a means
To numb the pain.
Your soul dies
With each day lived
Until suicide appears
The only solution.
Whether
By direct means
Like an O/D.
Or having someone else
Pulling the trigger
On your life.
Something
I have endured
For the past 45 years
Of my life.
As my tears fall
Proof of my witnessing
Those who have suffered.
Hoping
Next year
The pain will end.
Therisa © 2020
