Tell Me (Silent Sentence-2WC)

Tell me.

Tell me. I implore each of you.

Tell me, to whom do I appeal the verdict,

for this conviction that outlasts my memory?

My silent sentence confines me to isolation

in the midst of an over-populated world,

unable to know anything beyond myself.

Tell me.

Tell me if you know anything of my crime.

Surely, of my own conception I cannot be held in guilt.

Thus, I surmise my crime to be the fact

I survived my mother's womb.

For my guilt was proclaimed at birth,

and the silent sentence I received

is proclaimed anew each morning I awake

to find that I still yet breathe.

Tell me if you know.

Why is the punishment to my nameless crime

so severe as to never feel the warmth of love?

Why am I forever surrounded by words and faces of plasticity?

I alone drift aimlessly in a sea of men

who no nothing of my crime,

nor my guilt,

nor the punishment I endure.

I will tell you.

I will tell you that I ponder death daily.

I will tell you I contemplate ending my life by my own hand,

if only I could convince myself I still live.