Struggle IV

By Andrew R. Duckworth

I was the glass child,
Drop me and I would surely
Shatter into a million shards,
But shards unsharpened,
Harmless in the brutal battery
Of a mind that could not stay
Still if it was chained.
And, in a way, it was.
It was locked in a prison
Of grief in a classroom
I was desperately waiting
To break free of
But it bounced off the walls
Like a rubber ball with 
Endless energy.
And once that door opened,
I was on to the next prison,
Attempting to be the babbling
Scholar with a highbrow
And limitless certainty.

I found the keys buried
In the soil,
After I was no longer
Afraid to get my hands dirty.
The prison disappeared
And I was no longer
The glass child.
I was the metal man,
Malleable enough to think
Outside of my own ideas,
But strong enough, firm enough,
To know where I stand.
And where I stand
Is a foundation not of sand,
But one that has been tested,
One that has endured struggle,
And one that will endure it again,
Because it is the test
That constructs the best
Walls of the fortress.