We Journey On

You take my hand with furtive glance
Tentative with look askance
We sojourn both with you ahead
So hesitantly I am led
Crossing time into past tense
Not stymied by your deft defense
Your walls of silence and ennui
Your mental Pyrrhic victory
Blank faces cover what you lacked
Indifference which serves to distract
From when an innocence was gone
A darkness too close to the dawn
A faith in human kindness lost
Abandonment with lasting cost
A war with truth, your wounds display
You've led me down into the fray
Into the hateful loathing self
So often hidden on the shelf
Now in full force for me, but why
Are you prepared for this, am I?

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_crop","fid":"43575","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","id":"media_crop_9521734056625","media_crop_h":"0","media_crop_image_style":"-1","media_crop_instance":"4769","media_crop_rotate":"0","media_crop_scale_h":"0","media_crop_scale_w":"0","media_crop_w":"0","media_crop_x":"0","media_crop_y":"0","title":" ","typeof":"foaf:Image"}}]]A cleansing vessel for your faults
Not chipped away by your assaults
Not human with my own abuse
All present till I've lost my use
Privileged, yes, to be let in
Where even you have never been
Though times come where you are so pained
My sorrow auto-pilot drained
Dodging arrows left and right
Our armor damaged by the fight
Where confidence was straight ahead
Dejection has come in its stead
A helpless sense is what prevails 
The wind knocked out of battered sails.

And so our travels come to end
Attention focused on the mend
We hurriedly rebuild the trust
Lest iron gates succumb to rust
And with the walls again secured
With feelings of the proud and cured
You safely withdraw back to life
Protected from your inner strife
As I reflect upon our state
At times with anger, full of hate
For you exposed me to the hurt
You left me lonely in the dirt
At times with joy for what we've done
I broke your clouds with rays of sun
At times with weariness abound
To face the circle coming round
A daunting prospect I must face
Sometimes with great affected grace
But satisfaction takes its place
And hate is gone without a trace
For steel must come and doubts be gone
When next we meet and journey on.

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Disclosures:

Dr Ahuja is a psychiatrist at the Los Angeles LGBT Center with an interest in sexual and gender minority mental health. He currently serves on the IPS Committee of the American Psychiatric Association; the Board of the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association; and Vice President of the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists. He has written poetry for years.