Trading Demons

I’ve been trading demons
With someone dear to my heart.
Turns out
“We’re all human”
Means
We’ve a bit of
“Good God”
As well as
The good Lord.

I’ve been trading demons
All my life
With everyone I’ve ever known
In the streets
And on the television screen,
Face to face
And sight unseen.
I’ve a briefcase full of broken dreams,
Who I am and who I want to be:
Two very different things…

But maybe
We are built off the world we see,
Off the air we breathe
Off the people we meet,
And the words they speak…
The ideals we seek:
The fuel in our engine, the gasoline
To keep us moving forward,
To help us find where we are meant to be,
To lead us to
What we really need.

Now she’s asking:
Can we be saved?
She isn’t sure.
I know
We cannot
On our own
But together
Maybe.

34 thoughts on “Trading Demons

    1. Yes, yes we do… Funny how we keep carrying them around… Swapping bits of this and that, hoping we might someday be able to cobble something together resembling what we initially envisioned. 😉

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  1. Wonderfully written piece. Great rhyme and flow. It’s very true we all demons or problems, and we can all trade, or go back and forth on who deals with what in detail. But I like your idea of unity that we can rise above these problems. I think it’s a choice in some respects. Let our demons overtake us or act with dignity, with strength and fight. Wonderful, really 🙂

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    1. Thank you, Mandibelle. You are tactful in your analysis, and insightful in application.

      I like that you use the word dignity. Dignity is so important and so appropriate in this context. Dignity is really a complex concept. It is external in that we strive to maintain dignity so we are perceived as being dignified, but at the same time, dignity is something that we judge and maintain internally. We base it off our understanding, primarily driven by culture, of honor, of worth, of respect, but we are the only ones who define what this means to us, and in doing so, define what it means to maintain our dignity. When we gain or lose dignity, we are the ones accountable, for better or worse. In this way, dignity is both a very communal and personal concept at the same time.

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    1. 🙂 It does, but it also doesn’t. The further I go, the further I set my aspirations. I don’t plan on ever achieving a final “goal” for who I want to be. Each initial goal just serves as a mile marker to look back on and see the progress I have made.

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    1. Thank you! I really appreciate that. All of my writing contains/is pieces of me… But this one is particularly close to my heart. I am thankful that you enjoyed it.

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