The Boy Was Already A Shadow

I was twelve,
just a boy whose skin barely held his fears,
already a shadow of pain too sharp to share.
Then the bullet came,
hot and swift,
like a word spat out to wound
but never to take back.

The pain was a scream without a sound,
a red river pooling around me.
In that endless, fragile moment,
I wondered if this was how the world ends—
quiet, small, and still.

But it didn’t.
I lived, though not entirely.
The bullet wasn’t just lead, it was an author too—
as it rewrote who I might have become.

Something of me stayed in that car that night,
seeping into the fabric like a prayer
half-finished, but already answered and ordained.

Did he mean it?
What did you see me as when you pulled that trigger?
These questions settled like stones in my chest,
bending my back until my heart became
charred foil.

Years have slowed me now,
but when I trace the memory,
I wonder about that boy—
the boy before the bullet.
What might he have been
if he hadn’t already been a shadow,
if that bullet hadn’t tried
to turn him into one forever?

I forgave you.
That night even, as blood hardened on my skin.
I forgave you as the cops killed you.
And I’d forgive you still, even if they hadn’t.
I think I really am okay.
But are any of us, really?