Strength Comes From Our Worst Enemy

Engage me in this engagement
As I once was
As a young man

Of hope and excitement
That nothing could harm us.
How could it possibly,
When we've barely begun?
As big plans are upon us
To be reckless as we can

And induce me before introducing
It all, pain and misery
For this bravado projected,
As they do with all youth,
Is often filtered with lens
To a size that precedes us
Superseding true fragility

Now indulge me with the bulge
Of potential under scrapes and scars
That catapults us further
Weak than self involved
Tell me that in darkest nights
We hear the beauty of the calm
That things still transpire
Without proof in visual degrees
And that my indictment by
My tainted self perception
Has been liberated
Lifted
Gone