Words are my armor

I refuse to live my life as a cautionary tale.

How can I not heed the words of the millions gone before me

to do the thing that scares me and reminds me I'm alive?

To grab life by the horns

and ride that beast until I no longer breathe?

Why am I so incessantly aware

of every second where

I am wasted

behind a desk of paperwork and spreadsheets and caffeine?

This thing inside of me,

the wispy worm that writhes

around inside my mind

is dying every day.

The creativity that lived with me

as a child

has all but vanished,

and I know that's not why I was made,

To waste away into nothingness.

My words are my warriors

and I should let them ride into battle

to bleed into the pages of history.

That's where they're meant to be.

Not on a spreadsheet

or some group email

but in chain mail

with blood and brain and beauty

wrapped around them

on the battlefield.

Fight on, my friends

outlive us all.