Waxing Poetic Volume 2 - Stefan

            Stefan

My heart may no longer beat 

but tonight it breaks and bleeds

My past has taken it's hold

and ripped my present to shreds

My promises now ring false,hollow

the best intentions could not keep

My happiness slips away from me

the tears of pain I can not cease

My loves lips meet mine one last time

and then walks away with our future

Waxing Poetic Volume 1 - My Inside

A Sentiment for those who came before me no matter the time or distance between.

Ranting and Raving Vol 3 : Does it really make you feel better to cause someone else pain?

As a child I had my share of experience with bullies. There were three boys in my complex who torchered my brothers and myself. Every chance they got they would gather to gain up on us. I often thought they would lie in wait for the opportunity. It wasn't just my family they went after they teased and taunted and assaulted others kids that lived there but for some reason we seemed to be their special targets. I spent many a day crying over something they said or something they did to me. They were hateful and I hated them and to this day I remember their names and faces and pray I never see them again. As a teen I was threatened and humiliated for being artsy and bookish and overweight. I had people who I thought were my friends who I had spent so much time with turn on me and spread hateful rumors about me. To see their faces and know they hated me and not to know why made my head spin. When I did find out why I couldn't believe that one moment in time could change so much. But I was in the right and they had been so very wrong. There was one boy that loved to scream out slurs in the hallway at me. He always got a laugh and I always felt like crap. I wondered if I had a big target on my back that said KICK ME I'M DOWN but when I look back now it was probably because I did the very best I could to never let them know it got to me. Sometimes when I would get into sticky situations I'd pretend I didn't get the joke or go right along with it. I just knew that fighting back would only make things worse. I've seen a few of those people since I've graduated High School they would come up to me as if we were friends and they quickly found out that that was not the case. I think about all of the pain and indignity I went through for the tiniest of differences every time I hear about a young man or woman taking their lives because of the hazing they have had to endure. I think about the young girl who killed herself when a neighborhood Mother created a fake Facebook page in the guise of a boy, I think of the girl who immigrated to this country from Ireland looking for a better life only to hang herself in her closet because classmates labeled her a whore and I think about the series of young men in the recent weeks who have taken their lives due to homophobic taunts and slurs. I think about all these young lives lost and know that I did not have it any where as bad as they did. In my day the incidents were contained. Many times it was you and the bully or perhaps a small group of people there to witness your humiliation. These days it can be broadcast around the world in a push of a button. They can video tape it and put it on You tube or post it to their social networking site pages. They can text all of their friends to say come on down and watch the show. Words contain more venom. When you are surrounded by them and they are shouted at you from every person and place that you go there is nowhere to hide. To find peace. Even in your own head they are not silent. The hurt follows you everywhere and some do not have the fortitude to live through it. From what I can see little is being done to stop this type of behavior. In some cases charges have been filed most have been dropped and I know of only one conviction that was pretty much a slap on the wrist. Most of the time these people hide behind their right to freedom of speech. I do not believe our forefathers had any idea that our world was going to come to what it has when that right was given to us. I believe there needs to be consequences when someone right to free speech interferes with someone else's rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. You should not be aloud to run cart blanche over another persons life because the Constitution says you can. You should not be able to tape people without their permission. You should not be able to invade their privacy or stalk, threaten and harass them. You should not be able to use the technology of today to hide or broadcast your heinous acts. Most will have nothing done to them and will only have to live with what they have done until the day they meet their makers. I do not believe that that is nearly enough for most will not even notice or knowledge the blood they have on their hands. They will continue doing this to others. My heart goes out to each person who has felt that ending their lives was the only way out. I feel for their families and those who tried to help them and couldn't. I hope that the world will wake up and realize that this is an epidemic. That there needs to be more voices standing up to those who perpetrate this type of hate. The parents of the kids who feed off this hate need to look deep within themselves and find out why their children are this way. Those bringing up children now need to teach their children that this sort of behavior is not acceptable. That every person deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. What ever happened to treat others as you'd like them to treat you anyway? The school systems need to stand up and realize that these kids are not exaggerating. That sweeping it under the rug with a kids will be kids mentality is not acceptable. The people who live to make others lives hell need to know that there will be hell to pay for their actions. Every voice that says what these bullies are doing is not right may give someone in trouble the strength to go on. The strength to get help. The strength to get through it and know that it does indeed get better. They need to know they are not alone.