Sensitivity

To be sensitive to life is an act most courageous,

If you can do it, someday it’ll be contagious.

While it may sound simple, only the bold will endeavor 

To open one’s soul- to be vulnerable forever.  

I think we are all born with a sensitive heart,

Hate is a concept we learn to take part. 

Remain sensitive, in this world? Pretty slim chance. 

But true strength lies in inviting that dance.

To be sensitive is a choice we all have to face,

But many close up, it’s a much safer space.

A heart on a sleeve is a dangerous display,

The public’s a knife, sharpened to pierce and flay.  

One can’t experience light without darkness too,

We tasted the fruit, now the bill has come due.

Our range of emotions doesn’t come a la carte,

If you’re able to accept them, that’s a mighty fine start. 

Hiding from the pain only makes the strain worse,

Closing the heart sends the pain in reverse.

If you fortify your defenses with the hurt still inside,

Where else can it go? Within you it’ll reside.

When we build walls to protect our emotions,

We shut out all others in anti-devotion.

Rather than partitions, build bridges instead.

Invite the world in, danger’s all in your head.

With desensitization, it’s a lose/lose game.

The desensitized are incentivized to fight and defame. 

Have compassion, we mustn’t match their fire with ours too, 

To mend their broken ways needs only hope and some glue. 

Even the most cold and heartless were young once before, 

They played and had fun, till trouble washed ashore.

Any number of wrongdoings could have inspired their fence    

Insensitivity isn’t evil, it’s a survival defense.

So let’s teach our children to not shove feelings away,

And end the long cycle of callousness today. 

Reclaim sensitivity and dismantle your heart’s wall,

Because living without feeling is not living at all.