Make It Darker He Said

Make It Darker He Said

- by Lucy Hinton, 2012

Make it darker he said

Tell them how you’d really feel

if you met that stranger, that friend in the street

and spoke to them with the full urgency and potency and fierce and tender heart of who you really are

Informed by the hidden powers you contain, along with your capacity to be scary and angry and to make them shake inside, not just with the sweetness that cocoons your safety

Such that they might directly feel the precious enormity of what you have to say:

‘you have a choice

you can give up if you want to

you can cave in to resignation

and weariness

and the ebbing of getting old

and loss of meaning

you can be beaten back by failure

refusing to risk again

and though you may at times resist and resent the burden of belonging,

it is the sweetest gift of a burden you shall ever know

Life passes fast, and you will get to die soon enough

Yet whatever you do, whatever you do

you are part of this world

So admit to the truth

the one you tremble to admit, with trepidation and daring,

it’s not dying you’re most afraid of;

it’s not truly living’