Several years ago
Life led me to a fork that went both ways
One was known and everything I had been raised to be
The other was singular and marked with shame
The former was the only one I was supposed to take
A simple lie is all it would take
A sip of kool-aid to dull the pain
But I couldn't kneel before another's game
So I took the latter
Beginning a journey that belonged to me
I lost what childhood had given me,
I watched family and friends turn away
At eighteen that was a bitter thing
Deracinated from everything
It left me grasping to make sense of anything
As a child I had always been told about people like me
I had taken the red pill
The lies went away and I had to rebuild everything
I made home for myself
Not out there
Where the world spins without wait
But inside
Where my shadows dance and play
And I found my way
I still don't know where it leads
Or what I'll be along the way
But I've made peace with the pain that led me this way
And all the friends and family who have gone away,
Because I didn't see life their way
Now this path doesn't seem so lonely and the shame that marked the entrance was a lie to frighten me away.