The tools that destroyed me.

They bought me all the tools to destroy myself, put the match in my hand then I stepped off the shelf, gave me the chains and the cage and the key then said this is freedom but freedom ain't free, gave me the fear and the fire and the fuel, gave me the pressure and called it a rule, gave me the pain and the pride and the pleasure then watched me sink deeper and measured the pressure, but I'm not a machine I'm a mind I'm a motion I'm blood I'm a breath I'm a river of ocean, I'm not what you bought I'm not what you sold I'm not what you wrote in the book that you told, I'm breaking the pattern and bending the frame, I'm taking the ashes and rebuilding the flame, I'm turning the anger to energy, turning the enemy into my chemistry, turning the trauma to truth in the booth, turning the weight into words into proof, they handed me the hammer I hammered the habit, they handed me chaos I learned how to navigate it, they handed me chains I learned how to break 'em, they gave me lies I learned how to face 'em, they gave me fear I learned how to read it, they gave me a fall I learned how to lead it, they gave me shadows I learned how to see it, then I turned to the light and decided to be it, still breathing still building still burning still healing, still feeling still thinking still moving still dealing, still standing still learning still searching still turning, everything that they burned now I'm using it for burning, not burning myself but burning the barriers, the buried embarrassment the baggage and carriers, the voices in the back that kept telling me quit, the old definitions that said I was it, I'm more than a mistake I'm more than a moment, more than the noise and the poisoned components, more than the night and the weight and the weather, I'm putting the pieces of the future together, water in the veins and the blood in the beat, feet on the earth and the fire in the feet, river keeps running and root keeps growing, even when winter has covered the snowing, the forest doesn't panic when the leaves have to fall, it waits for the spring and then answers it all, so I will not worship the damage I didn't choose, I will not let my worst day dictate my views, I will not let anybody purchase control, over my hands or my heart or my soul, they bought me all the tools to destroy myself but they never bought the right to decide my health, they never bought my life they never bought my name, they never bought the spark that kept feeding the flame, they thought it was over they thought I was done, but they didn't know what I'd become, they thought I would fall and remain in the floor, I'm building the future they can't own anymore, they handed me the chains now I turn them to art, they handed me the dark now I light up the heart, they handed me the ashes now I plant in the ground, they handed me destruction now I'm building what's sound, they bought me the tools to the end of my rope, but I turned them into a reason for hope, not because it was easy,