I used to think, to fully experience you, I had to cry.
To feel sorrow or grief of some sort.
Maybe because seeing your face meant the pain would come flooding back.
Pain of the mistakes, the empty promises, the what-ifs or maybes.
Pain of the loneliness, the brokenness, the abuse,
or maybe just the simple reminders of how many times I used you.
And seeing how others acted around you would make me think that they were getting the same feelings, but accompanied with the memory of how you saved them from themselves.
I used to think there was something wrong with me.
Why were my cheeks not tear-stained?
Why was I not on my knees?
Was that you even speaking to me?
I used to think they were freaks.
Screaming and running.
Dancing and singing.
Laughing and also trembling.
That was of course until you liberated me.
When I was a child I thought as a child.
God, how foolish of me,
to think You would cause me grief.
I was blind, but now I see, that you are the bringer of peace.
I can't help but sing.
I can't help but be everything I mocked,
Everything I thought I would never be.
I see now that I no longer grieve because you have brought me joy.
You have brought me life and life more abundantly.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with me.
What once was broken, scarred, and empty is now whole.
Thanks to you, I'm happy to say that I can finally breathe.

Inside me an unquenchable fire,
Rising and falling as a phoenix dies and is reborn in the purest of flames.
With every rise an unbearable pain uncomparable to anything I've ever experienced before.
With every fall a gut wrenching agony of searing pain.
Ebbing and flowing like the tide beneath a full moon, waves of acid crashing against walls of flesh.

No more of this can I take.

One, surely not enough, two I take instead for with this battle I will require all the help I can get.
I throw them in and begin to chew ravenously like a beast starved of food.
Chalky, dry and the strangest taste of mints fill my mouth and cling to my teeth.
I muster all the saliva I can and swallow the precious substance.
Within seconds I feel it hit the depths of my stomach, plunging in like an icy sword.
And so begins the battle of all ages, a clash of titans in a seemingly pointless battle for nawt but relief.
Like two dragons, one of fire the other of ice ferociously battling tooth and claw.
As the war rages on neither seem to be gaining the upper hand, both evenly matched in their immense strength.

After what seemed like hours yet only took mere minutes to pass, the dust settles and there is no winner in sight, in a final almighty clash the two dragons destroy each other leaving behind no trace of this ever happening.
The pain subsides and the burning gone, finally now I can be free from the fiery chains that once bound me.

The pools of water in my eyes,
Blur my vision,
But for once,
I'm okay with not seeing.