The Drought

In the beginning your words were only droplets of rain that never really got anything wet. Your earliest murmurings were like those barely perceptible flyspecks of moisture that make pedestrians stop and hold out their hands, palms towards the sky, waiting for the slightest confirmation of what their noses and cheeks already suspect.

Your first words were scattered here and there so hesitantly that sometimes your parents wondered if they had only imagined them. 

Like everyone else, your words had humble beginnings. They started small, but they grew over time. They gained confidence whenever their utterings produced desired results. They formed more frequently and less apprehensively. After a while, they joined forces with each other and started appearing two or three at a time. Everyone around you waited eagerly to hear what you would say next. 

You soon realized your words could elicit reactions, change moods, and divert plans.

Your words could be a tidal wave, breaking and crashing. Capsizing and wrecking. Or they could be a gentle creek, trickling and bubbling. Calming and soothing.

Your words made things happen, and you discovered they were powerful.

You were powerful.

But then the years went by and you saw things, felt things, heard things, and did things that you wish you had not done. There were things you couldn’t, or shouldn’t, or simply didn’t know how to say. You had so many words, but they either came out wrong or not at all.

The world taught you that stuffing words or hurling them was the only way to deal with what you had been through. But stuffing them left you cold, and hurling them left you alone. Whether you were silent or screaming, the result was the same:

Your words dried up. 

You could still speak, but you no longer had anything to say. At least, that’s what you told yourself the world was saying.

So you carried the weight of your unspoken words through the years, and you wanted someone to hear them and understand them, but there was no one who really listened to the words the way you wanted to say them, the way they deserved to be said.So you screamed useless words that got you nowhere to take your mind off the weight you were carrying. The words that mattered – that ones that might have made a difference – those were the words you silently screamed at yourself without ever making a sound. And the weight was unbearable, but you had found no one who cared.

Maybe you’ve been through things, and those things have left you voiceless. Words could never do justice to the pain you are carrying. It’s true that too many words get in the way of themselves, but it’s also true that silence is not always golden. Some things need to be said, even if only quietly to yourselfwhen you are alone in your room with the blinds closed and your phone powered off.

You need those words as much as they need you. Your soul can only stay parched for so long. You have so many words, and those words might bring healing if you let them. If you share them, not caring who hears them or what they might think.

I may not know your story, but I know mine, and I know that down deep, we are the same. We get used up, chewed up, fed up, and we screw up. We think we know it all only to find out we know nothing at all. We are young and then we are old, and somewhere in between lie all the words we needed to speak but wouldn’t, or shouted when we shouldn’t, or wanted to take back but couldn’t. 

Your words that started as tiny flyspecks of moisture may have evaporated, but they never really vanished. They hover heavy in your heart, praying for a downpour. Those hovering words have left you dry and parched, nothing more than kindling waiting for a spark. Where there is no moisture, fire follows. And when that wildfire starts, it will burn right through you. It will not discriminate. It will take the good with the bad and leave nothing behind.

So give voice to your dry and crackling words. Maybe they cannot be captured and subdued into neat rows on paper, but they still deserve to be heard. Get used to the sound of them in your head and on your lips. Let them gain confidence and join forces like they did in the beginning.

Then stand out in the street with your palms towards the sky,and let the rains come.