BROKEN CHILDREN ARE HARD TO MEND
For children who were broken
It is very hard to mend...
Our pain was rarely spoken
and we hid the truth from our friends.
Our parents alisema they loved us,
but they didn't act that way.
They broke our hearts
and aliiba our worth,
with the things they would say.
We wanted them to upendo us,
We didn't know what we did
to make them yell at us
and wish we weren't their kid.
They'd beat us up and scream at us
and blame us for their lives.
Then they'd hold us close inside their arms
and tell us confusing lies
of how they really loved us-
even though we were BAD,
and how is was OUR fault they hit us,
OUR fault that they were mad.
When days were just beginning
we sometimes prayed for them to end,
and when the pain kept coming,
we learned to just pretend
that we were good
and so were they
and this was just
one of those days...
tomorrow we'd be friends.
We had to believe it so.
We had nowhere else to go.
Each siku that we pretended,
we replaced reality
with lies, au dreams,
au angry schemes,
in tafuta of dignity...
until our lies
got bigger than the truth,
and we had no one real to be.
Our bodies were forsaken.
With no salama place to hide,
we learned to stop
hearing and feeling
what they did to our outsides.
We tried to make them upendo us,
till we hated ourselves instead,
and couldn't see a way out,
and wished that they were dead.
We scared ourselves kwa thinking that,
and scared ourselves to know,
that we were uigizaji just like them
and might ever zaidi be so.
To be half the size of a grown-up
and trapped inside their pain...
To every siku lose everything
with no saviour au refrain...
To wonder how it is possible
that god could so forget
the worthy child wewe knew wewe were,
when wewe had not been damaged yet...
To figure on your fingers
that the years till you'd be grown
enough to leave the torment
and survive away from home,
were zaidi than wewe could count to,
au zaidi than wewe could bear,
was the reality we lived in
and we knew it wasn't fair.
We who grew up broken
are somewhat out of time,
struggling to mend our childhood,
when our peers are in their prime.
Where others find love
and contentment,
we still often have to strive
to remember we are worthy,
and Heroes just to be alive.
Some of us are healing,
some are stealing.
Most are passing the anger on.
Some give their lives away to drugs,
au the promise of lfe beyond.
Some still hide from society.
Some struggle to belong.
But all of us wishing
the past would not hold on so long.
There's alot of digging down to do
to find the child within,
to upendo away the ugly pain
and feel innocence again.
There is forgiveness worthy of angels wings
for remembering those at all,
who abused our sacred childhood
and programmed us to fall.
To seek to understand them,
and how their pain became our own,
is to risk the ground we stand on
to climb the mountain home.
The journey is not so lonely
as in the past it's been...
zaidi of us are strong enough
to let the growth begin.
But while we're trekking up the mountain
we need everything we've got,
to face the adults we have become, and all that we are not.
So when wewe see us weary
from the day's internal climb...
When we find fault with your best efforts,
au treat imperfection as purposeful crime...
When yu see our quick defenses,
our efforts to control,
our readiness to form a plan
of unrealistic goals...
When we run into a conflict
and fight to the uchungu, chungu end,
remember...
We think that winning means
we won't be hurt again.
When we abandon OUR thoughts
and feelings, to be what we believe YOU
want us to be,
au look at trouble we're having,
and want to blame it all on you...
When life calls for new beginnings,
and we fear they're doomed to end,
remember...
Wounded trust is like a wounded knee-
it is very hard to bend.
Please remember this when we are out of sorts, Tell us the truth, and be our friend.
For children who were broken...
it is very hard to mend.
For children who were broken
It is very hard to mend...
Our pain was rarely spoken
and we hid the truth from our friends.
Our parents alisema they loved us,
but they didn't act that way.
They broke our hearts
and aliiba our worth,
with the things they would say.
We wanted them to upendo us,
We didn't know what we did
to make them yell at us
and wish we weren't their kid.
They'd beat us up and scream at us
and blame us for their lives.
Then they'd hold us close inside their arms
and tell us confusing lies
of how they really loved us-
even though we were BAD,
and how is was OUR fault they hit us,
OUR fault that they were mad.
When days were just beginning
we sometimes prayed for them to end,
and when the pain kept coming,
we learned to just pretend
that we were good
and so were they
and this was just
one of those days...
tomorrow we'd be friends.
We had to believe it so.
We had nowhere else to go.
Each siku that we pretended,
we replaced reality
with lies, au dreams,
au angry schemes,
in tafuta of dignity...
until our lies
got bigger than the truth,
and we had no one real to be.
Our bodies were forsaken.
With no salama place to hide,
we learned to stop
hearing and feeling
what they did to our outsides.
We tried to make them upendo us,
till we hated ourselves instead,
and couldn't see a way out,
and wished that they were dead.
We scared ourselves kwa thinking that,
and scared ourselves to know,
that we were uigizaji just like them
and might ever zaidi be so.
To be half the size of a grown-up
and trapped inside their pain...
To every siku lose everything
with no saviour au refrain...
To wonder how it is possible
that god could so forget
the worthy child wewe knew wewe were,
when wewe had not been damaged yet...
To figure on your fingers
that the years till you'd be grown
enough to leave the torment
and survive away from home,
were zaidi than wewe could count to,
au zaidi than wewe could bear,
was the reality we lived in
and we knew it wasn't fair.
We who grew up broken
are somewhat out of time,
struggling to mend our childhood,
when our peers are in their prime.
Where others find love
and contentment,
we still often have to strive
to remember we are worthy,
and Heroes just to be alive.
Some of us are healing,
some are stealing.
Most are passing the anger on.
Some give their lives away to drugs,
au the promise of lfe beyond.
Some still hide from society.
Some struggle to belong.
But all of us wishing
the past would not hold on so long.
There's alot of digging down to do
to find the child within,
to upendo away the ugly pain
and feel innocence again.
There is forgiveness worthy of angels wings
for remembering those at all,
who abused our sacred childhood
and programmed us to fall.
To seek to understand them,
and how their pain became our own,
is to risk the ground we stand on
to climb the mountain home.
The journey is not so lonely
as in the past it's been...
zaidi of us are strong enough
to let the growth begin.
But while we're trekking up the mountain
we need everything we've got,
to face the adults we have become, and all that we are not.
So when wewe see us weary
from the day's internal climb...
When we find fault with your best efforts,
au treat imperfection as purposeful crime...
When yu see our quick defenses,
our efforts to control,
our readiness to form a plan
of unrealistic goals...
When we run into a conflict
and fight to the uchungu, chungu end,
remember...
We think that winning means
we won't be hurt again.
When we abandon OUR thoughts
and feelings, to be what we believe YOU
want us to be,
au look at trouble we're having,
and want to blame it all on you...
When life calls for new beginnings,
and we fear they're doomed to end,
remember...
Wounded trust is like a wounded knee-
it is very hard to bend.
Please remember this when we are out of sorts, Tell us the truth, and be our friend.
For children who were broken...
it is very hard to mend.
