Must we be broken hearted to feel

We unfeelingly move through the streets. Questioning motives and belittling battles with no information of those around us, but the look on their faces and the shoes on their feet. We pass the heroes and villains of society unflinchingly. Staying in between the broken and the whole, the storm and the calm, the alone and the unified, we avoid pain. Life’s injustices are lost amid the ticking of seconds. Unnoticed in the confusion. No screams of outrage. No movement to the extremes of our emotional limits. No movement of any kind. Afraid to feel alive for fear of experiencing weakness, we become lost.

Must we be broken hearted to feel? Must we see the storm to experience the calm? Must we be alone, in order to really be together? Must injustice take away everything from one, so that others may move freely? Must we drift in order to find purpose?

Leaving this realm of safe apathy, we succumb to the world. By leaving the middle, we inevitably choose sides. We inevitably fail and we inevitably succeed. The lows of life experienced with such intensity as to rival the highs. But the feeling of desolation, of rock bottom, brings out an undeniable passion. We move with renewed purpose and intensity. In loneliness we inevitably find companionship. Outrage inspires action, tears fueling fire and contention. Through experienced injustice, voices raise calling for change. Through bursts of humanity the drifter finds a home, a mission. Toeing the boundaries of our sentiments we seek to find ourselves again. From the depths of despair and the pinnacles of triumph, we risk it all, in order to have anything at all to risk.