survival

when you survive, you rejoice in quiet restraint. as if your survival offends those who didn't. why am i here and they are not? they deserved breath and love and joy. they deserved to feel the sun warm their face and the cool ocean water lapping at their ankles. does my celebration cause them pain? do they look at me and wonder, "why her and not me?"

survival is a precarious thing. the pressure to live fully and completely to make you worthy of such a thing is great. and yet, i still breathe.

i still hold my children on my lap, inhaling their youth, smoothing their hair. i still get lost in nature, watching birds as they build their treetop mansions. i still love and feel loved. i still feel the touch of someone who once feared losing me.

for all of this, i wake grateful every day. my eyes open and i wonder how i am so blessed to see another day. my feet feel the cool hardwood as i climb out of bed, and i know i just as easily could have never felt its touch again.

what if this guilt is really just grief, knowing they will never feel this again. i like to think they are looking down and seeing me with love, the way i love them still.