The context behind this poem is that I had a twin sibling that died in the womb, and when I found out about it as a teenager it wrecked me, I guess I got caught up in the mindset that it was unfair that I was alive and my sibling wasn't. Which is true, it's not at all fair, and I feel guilty about it, and I know I should just shrug it off because "life is rarely fair", as Katherine Poleski would say. But it's hard to shrug off. and I still feel really sad about it sometimes.
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Survivor's Guilt, by Nicolas Stagliano
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shadows and light mingle and mix,
morning sun pushed through the blinds,
irreverent, vain and glorious, invading,
the place where disgust meets indifference.
dawn's false convalescence.
he sought heaven but sunk in his sins,
all his motives and every narrative therein,
love, life, history,
ephermeral, immaterial, temporary
he buried his burdens in the mud,
he buried them with vomit and blood,
but the weight of the world will never lift,
through his soul he endlessly sifts.
imperfect, inadequate, unworthy.
he wishes he died beside you.
you will never know life.
he usurps your right to exist.
the guilt will never subsist.
sin and shame, contempt, lividity.
temporary, fleeting, numb.