WHEN HOPE DECAYS

Sometimes I pray that hope won’t stay,
‎yet beg it never fades away.
‎It is a curse, it is a flame,
‎a ghost that answers when I name.
‎
‎It comes unasked, it leaves at will,
‎it warms the bones, then leaves them still.
‎It plants a seed in barren ground,
‎then buries roots without a sound.
‎
‎It wore my patience thin as thread,
‎still I wait where angels bled.
‎Why I linger, why I kneel—
‎I do not know, I only feel.
‎
‎I sit with clocks that mock my chest,
‎their ticking never lets me rest.
‎Each second drips like poison rain,
‎and hope returns to feed the pain.
‎
‎Sometimes it throws a rope to drown,
‎then calls it mercy, pulls you down.
‎It gives a reason still to dream,
‎to stitch a smile where none has been.
‎
‎A reason to rise, to fake the light,
‎to drag your corpse through one more night.
‎To comb your hair, to wash your face,
‎to act like grief has left no trace.
‎
‎To wear false joy upon your skin,
‎and hide the war that lives within.
‎To laugh at jokes you do not hear,
‎while choking softly on your fear.
‎
‎It tells you, “Wait, your dawn will come,”
‎while evening beats another drum.
‎It whispers softly, “Just hold on,”
‎then leaves before the dark is gone.
‎
‎But often hope will break a man,
‎more cruel than hate, more cold than sand.
‎It makes you foolish, makes you wait,
‎with open hands at a locked gate.
‎
‎It makes you bite your bleeding tongue,
‎repeat old hymns once proudly sung.
‎It bends your back, it bows your head,
‎and feeds on tears you thought were shed.
‎
‎It steals your faith in self and sky,
‎then leaves you there to ask it why.
‎It shows you stars you cannot touch,
‎and punishes you wanting much.
‎
‎It turns the wise to desperate fools,
‎makes beggars out of kings with rules.
‎It paints tomorrow bright and clear,
‎then stains it black when it draws near.
‎
‎I keep my expectations low,
‎expect the worst where’er I go.
‎I build my walls from doubt and stone,
‎so grief won’t find me all alone.
‎
‎It may be wrong, I know, I know—
‎but madness grows where bright hopes grow.
‎I’d rather brace for coming storms
‎than trust the sun to keep me warm.
‎
‎Yet in the end I always crawl
‎back to the thing that caused it all.
‎Like wounded beasts return to traps,
‎I find my way through old collapse.
‎
‎Because without hope, dreams decay,
‎and night would never leave the day.
‎Without that lie, that shining thread,
‎I’d sink beside my heavier dead.
‎
‎A double-edged blade with rusted seam,
‎it cuts both truth and cuts the dream.
‎Held with care, it parts the wall—
‎held too long, it makes you fall.
‎
‎It can free chains no hands could break,
‎or split the heart till both sides ache.
‎It can raise towers from the dust,
‎or turn devotion into rust.
‎
‎And through it all, I live in dread,
‎of waking up with hope stone-dead.
‎For if one day it does not rise,
‎I’ll know the grave has reached my eyes.
‎
‎For when I cannot hope again,
‎I’ll just be flesh pretending men.
‎A breathing shape, a borrowed name,
‎a body walking without flame.
‎
‎When hope is gone, I too am through,
‎an empty shell with nothing true.
‎No pulse of wonder, no desire,
‎no smoke, no spark, no hidden fire.
‎
‎And if I cannot dream once more,
‎there’ll be no world worth living for.
‎The sky would close, the earth would dim,
‎and every prayer grow cold and thin.
‎
‎So let it wound me, let it stay,
‎let hope consume me day by day.
‎For though it ruins all I know,
‎without its knife—I cannot grow.