I have a wound. Deep within my soul. One that stings and pulsates from time to time. When it's triggered. The burn like salt or lemon juice squeezed inside. Reminiscent of the first cut. Reminding me it's there.
Over time, the pain has lessened. A scar now formed. Cell by cell. Stitch by stitch. Fresh. Raw. Fragile. This tissue new. Proving the wound is just below the surface. Letting me know the repair is delicate. Present. Real. Slightly tender around the edges.
To heal is "to become well. Or improve." But the emotional wound is unique. It is internal. Deep. A slicing of my soul. One I can't force to fix. I've tried. My attempts and tactics, to handle both wound and blemish have never worked. Only prolonged the discomfort.
I have tried to ignore the wound. Assuming it will go away, on its own. Assuming time will heal. Silencing it. Meanwhile, disregarding its complexity. While it festers. The way wounds do when they go untreated. Spreading to other areas of my body, my life. Causing further infection. More heartbreak. Feeling myself grow rigid along the way. Feeling myself grow as quiet as I expect of the wound.
I have tried protecting it by building a wall. So others can't get close enough to see it. Poke it. Tease it. Shielding it like a barrier. Never bonding. Connecting. Denying it comfort. Contact. Feeling myself morph into a security guard in the process. Serious. Defensive. Who I am changing. All while leaving the wound open and in need. Pulsating for attention.
I've tried medicating it. Numbing the irritation. Smothering it with globs of ointment. The lubricant camouflaging the wound behind it's thick film. Blurring my vision of both the wound and myself in the process. All while missing my intended target. Spreading the poison throughout my body. Sickening my spirit.
I've tried covering it up. Like a band aid. Concealing it. Masking it under a cloak. A cloak I assume you would be more comfortable looking at. Sparing people the gruesome sight of a blistering lesion. Open. Bloody. Exposed. While it still stings, aches and throbs beneath the fabric. Only allowing others to see I'm damaged. But not sharing how deeply. While I feel the shame and weight of hiding.
I've tried forcing the wound together. Expecting it will adhere and be the same. When it can't be. The scar itself thickening under the pressure. The expected bind being equally as traumatic. Forced before its ready. Like a keloid. Puffy. Inflamed. Showing the strain of the repair. Evidence the emotional wound left a mark. Branding both me and the event. Together. Forever.
Showing me I didn't give it what it needed. The needs I hadn't acknowledged. Attempting to now. As I see its depth. Holding time and space for it. Allowing it to come together when its purpose is served. In the journey of the repair. Morphing, transforming, becoming whatever scar it needs to be. Cell by cell. Stitch by stitch. Interweaving to create a new tissue. A thicker tissue, a scar tissue, along the parted line in order to survive. To keep it, me, together. In a new form. A battle wound. A battle I am now on the other side of. The marking of a warrior.
Marking my soul. Proof of the life I have lived. The love I have had. The loss I have felt. The persistence to continue. Back together, with fractures of where I had fallen apart. Repaired, but altered. Developed. Created in the process.
Restored with an insight, a perception, a vision, I only have from experiencing the wound itself. A wound I now choose to hold in its fragile state. In the uncomfortable feelings, of pain, itch, and irritation in the process of mending. It has changed me to my core. To the root of its origin. As deeply as the wound was cut.
Exposing myself now as its outward scar. For the world to see. Sharing it, so others maybe see their scars in mine. I'm not back to the same. I never will be. I am different. I am scarred. I, like the scar, have become something new in order to survive. Cell by cell. Tissue by tissue. Realizing that effect was the whole purpose of the wound. To mend and start anew. Yet, still delicate. Fresh. Raw.
In retrospect, I see the beauty in the pain. A growth in the mend. A becoming in the formation of the scar. Knowing I never repaired the wound. It was the wound that repaired me. Looking back and sitting present, I see I am well now. But in so many ways, I am also improved.