Initus

Source: Tracy Korn

And of it all, at least I can say... at the very least I can say that come stumbling be damned I came. At the very least I can say I decided, whether I knew it or not, that happiness would be defined thusly or as such, and that I would not pretend or accept or cower before even the greatest of improbability or precariously stacked odds in the pursuit of it. That I would not succumb to the oppression of another or dilute myself or make due or compromise my character. That I would declare and then deliver, and that I would be true to my beliefs regardless of the penalties, for even they belong to me if they are so earned.

At the very least I can say that I fought until it all fought back, and then I will revel in my ability to accurately and honestly recount that I braced and mustered a cocky display for my face before I charged back in, and in fact fought some more.

At the very least I can say of my life that yes, I have been a cynic. That yes, I have been naive and impatient and stubborn and foolish, and that I have made bad decisions, but I will never have to suffer saying that I have been a coward. I have never been a coward, and I have admittedly paid handsomely for the non-title and the right to claim myself ungoverned by those who would have me broken and agreeable.

I believe no fate is worse than that of never knowing how I could have lived were I not compromised, were I not untrue to myself, were I not afraid or intimidated back from action or talked out of follow through. Jangling bones that interrupt my sleep, the what and the if. Especially when they rattle 'round the neck of risk, and impede emancipating breaths breathed before the white flag of discouragement dropped to knee, and pleading for me to stop.

If I am to fall, let me fall, for I would not surrender. If I am to bleed, let me bleed, for I would not die unscathed.

Given this, at the very least I can say, as I lie there under the weight of having lost, that I believed this much in myself.

And at the most, I will be remembered a warrior.

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