“Wounds of Brokeness”, when healing is nothing but a mirage

Sometimes, you wake up to brokeness
He waits on you as a servant waits on his master
He lurks around
Stepping into your footprint
His presence reeks of painful days and bitter memories

Sometimes you wake up numb
The kind of numbness that travels deep into your emotions
The one that makes the tears fall without your notice
The one that pulls at your heart and throws your self-worth out the window into the drain

Sometimes you wake up forgetting your name
You look in the mirror and you only see a stranger
You ask questions she has no answers to
You sing songs whose lyrics are not familiar
You hear voices you don’t recognize
You barely live

Sometimes you wake up to healing
A kind of healing without a name
Healing your inner self can not afford
Yet the girl next door shoves it down your throat and closes your mouth tight so you don’t puke
The kind of healing that someone slaps on your face
The kind of healing that makes you cry till you pass out
The kind of healing that makes you want to sleep and not wake up again
That soothing kind of healing that is but a mirage

Sometimes you wake up to people who love you
Their love is like the breeze hits you when you step out yet you can’t accept
You can’t accept it because you don’t have a heart anymore and love means nothing to you
You can’t accept because, just like those who came, you’d wake up one day and they wouldn’t be there
They’d pack their love and leave when you are dreaming about them
They leave traces of memories all over the place
They leave pieces of themselves
They leave footprints
They leave you
Sometimes, just sometimes…

******

Courtesy of the author

Link to the Italian translation

Afia Amoaa Oppong-Kwakye is a Ghanaian writer. She started to put down on paper her emotions and inspirations when she was a child.
She is the author of the chapbook “Letters to Jey”. She is a Girl-Child advocate, a UNFPA Influencer for the National Youth Authority (Ghana), and a public speaker as well.

Most of her poems center on women’s empowerment and mental health; a selection of her most notable works have been included in the projects Ehalakasa Ghana and AfroWomen Poetry (with translations into Italian).

She loves fiction, good food and her spouse, and she believes kind words bring more colour to the world.