#survivorvoices
I have walked through shadows darker than night,
Felt hands that should have held crush me with fright.
I have known the pain that no one should see,
Yet still I rise, still I fight, still I breathe free.
My little warrior’s laugh is the anchor in storm,
A tiny heart keeping me steady and warm.
Crow’s spirit whispers, steady and near,
A light in the chaos, a voice I hear.
I brace for the worst, hope for the best,
Scars are my armor, instincts my test.
I read the lies, the danger, the signs,
I protect what is real, through endless lines.
The world misunderstands, judges, and mocks,
Labels the vigilance I cannot unbox.
But I am hardwired, born of fire and pain,
Every loss, every tear, every scar leaves a gain.
I am Phoenix, I am flame, I am bone,
I rise from the ashes, never alone.
Through trauma, through love, through chaos and fight,
I carry my little warrior, my flame, into the light.
Mar 8
Mar 8, 2026 at 1:24 PM UTC
They say it’s rules, procedures, law,
Paper shields to hide what they saw.
They claim they protect, they claim they care,
But the truth is buried somewhere in there.
We walk in with hearts still cracked,
Bones still bruised, minds still hacked.
We speak our truth, we show our fight,
They nod politely, then say “not right.”
Hours cut short, visits denied,
Our instincts questioned, our courage defied.
They think in forms, in boxes, in charts,
But they don’t see the battles in our hearts.
We survived fire they cannot feel,
Felt hands meant to heal break and steal.
Yet they judge what they cannot know,
Punish the vigilance trauma will grow.
Our walls, our caution, our scanning eyes,
Seen as paranoia, as lies, as cries.
But we are the warriors who lived the night,
While the system sleeps, blinded by light.
They train, they read, they study, they plan,
But never will they fully understand.
No book, no seminar, no courtroom seat,
Can teach the heat of the nights we beat.
So here we stand, scarred but alive,
The system ticks, but we survive.
We are instinct, fire, memory, bone,
And no policy will make us alone.
Mar 8
Mar 8, 2026 at 1:09 PM UTC
They call it pichi rathalu,
a waste of ink and time.
But they don’t see the tremble in my hands
when I hold a pen,
or the storm I quiet
by pouring pain into lines.
Each word I write
is a cry I never screamed,
a tear I never showed,
a wound I stitched
with syllables no one dared to read.
They say, “Just study, forget all this.”
But how do you forget
what saved you?
These writings—
they aren’t just thoughts.
They’re survival.
They’re scars made beautiful.
"Let Them Call It Madness"
They call it pichi rathalu.
They laugh. Say I’m wasting time.
Say I should just focus on studies, like everyone else.
But they don’t know.
They don’t know these pages hold my pain—
not drama, not attention-seeking.
Real pain. The kind that keeps you up at 2 AM.
The kind that chokes you when you're trying to smile.
I write because if I don’t, I’ll explode.
I write because it’s the only thing that listens without judgment.
Because no one asked me,
“What happened?”
They just said,
“Be strong.”
“Move on.”
“Stop being so emotional.”
So I bleed on paper.
That’s not madness. That’s survival.
Let them call it anything.
This—
this is the only thing keeping me alive.
May 30, 2025
May 30, 2025 at 9:16 AM UTC
Body:
“The thing is—you all can never compete with me.
I came to be when he no longer craved to be him.
I was forged as reminder, a warning:
That the fall would be brutal if he slipped even an inch.
But he stood tall, brimming with will and flame.
Now look at what you’ve all done to him.”
The body cries in agony.
The pain went away—
But the scars never did.
Mind:
“The boy was prepared, but green—
He pulled through, yes, but it cost him everything.
And now you boast of being unbroken?
It was I who inhaled the fumes,
Took in the blades of thought,
Endured the bruises that whispered ruin beneath the skin.
While you remained, stagnant and crude—
A venom sapping every ounce of his fortitude.
Like a Geist twined with Grue,
I was meant to imagine, to narrate, to survive and renew.
But your pride will drown us in this undertow.
You act like this is all a game?
No wonder they gave you the role they did.”
The mind counters, fire in its breath.
The mental quivers with angst.
The memories went away—
But the scars never did.
Spirit:
“Me? I was never told to share—only to care.
Maybe I came too late.
I always prayed for our fair,
But the universe doesn’t barter in balance.
It demands variation, disruption,
To witness, to scatter, to shimmer through us.
It hums a silence so vast it aches—
Searching for vessels to cradle its flair.
It has no morality, no mercy,
Only the echo of what it wills.
What we do is all it ever notices.
We are its muse,
Dancing to a symphony that stretches beyond the stars.”
The Spirit spoke, and silence fell.
The body and mind, though bruised and bitter,
Rekindled their uneasy affair.
But the Spirit wept—not out of pain,
But for the truth laid bare.
It was a dilemma no one could deny.
The tune was silent—
Yet louder than ever.
An unheard melody drifting from afar.
A Symphony of Scars.
-Asher Graves
May 1, 2025
May 1, 2025 at 8:45 AM UTC