Brave

I used to worry about the fact that,
because I chose not to drive, and
by the time I was 35 everyone in
my immediate family had either
died, moved on, or been tactfully
estranged for safety reasons, almost
everyone my age I knew, or could
know, who was trying to build and
take care of theirs would find my
presence overwhelmingly disagreeable
and impossibly juvenile, even when
they wished otherwise,

and that because of this lack of
meaningful connections during the
prime years of my life, I would at best
become a reclusive late starter, and
worst, become a local tragedy parents
tell their kids about when they want
to scare them into leaving their talents
behind and growing up for the sake
of some decent vacation miles.

I walked around town numb and
hypervigilant, expecting to be
assassinated, and could hear a once
college friend’s words whispering
from the streetlights in my head
how I better be careful how I argue
for what I believe in public, or I’ll
be shot like MLK Jr.

Better to be dead and honest, than
alive and a coward, I told her in
that sociology class, confident that
if there ever was an assassination
attempt on my life, for my being
too controversial, I’d survive it,
because I simply wanted to fight, or
maybe just wanted another
opportunity to be brave. Like a true
rebel, the likes of which you rarely
see now, I wanted to drive myself
back that bad.