Tomorrow's Scars (poem) Lyrics

The present scabs over my sutured past

I'm healing and I am dry

And there's this conscious flicking itch to go back

So like a shadow chasing dusk

I pick at the scab and scratch away progress

I open up old wounds of familiar pain, we like familiar

That's why some people never let their life scab

They've grown too accustomed to the bleeding

I still bleed but I also scab

And each time it forms again it's a little smaller

A little less invasive

So I find myself in this loop

A loop where the act of healing and the act of hurting

Are so entwined it's hard to tell them apart

It's like a dance where the music never really stops

But the rhythm, it changes, it evolves

And you can learn a lot about yourself from dancing

I learned that sometimes we don't get to pick our dance partners

And that sometimes I pick my scabs

But despite my picking and the makeshift band-aids barely concealing the hurt

Beneath it all, a quiet transformation brews

Persistent, inevitable healing, etching its slow

But unyielding growth into the fabric of my being

It's become clear that the healing of oneself

Is not a clean-cut process

It's hard to tell where one stage ends and the other begins

And sometimes they bleed into one another

And so somewhere along the scratches of life

There's the peroxide phase

It stings like harsh truths and tough love

But it's cleaning and it's purifying

I think that's where I am right now

Ripping off my smallest scabs yet

And this time diving deep into the flesh

Not just skimming the surface

And I could tell you that it often hurts more than

The wound itself ever did, but it's a clean hurt

It's a hurt that heals

I've been thinking about butterflies lately

You know, before they get their wings and colors

They're just in between

They're not what they were, but not yet what they're going to be

It's a vulnerable place full of potential, but also full of uncertainty

That's where I am right now, the in-between

And sometimes in that in-between

I find myself crawling back into that broken cocoon

It's a familiar shelter, but it's not the same

It's fragmented, and I know it

And because I know it, the comfort fades

I've outgrown the place, but still

I find myself there seeking a solace that no longer exists

I've been thinking about flowers right before they bloom

There's this moment, this pause where

Everything's building up to something beautiful

But it's not there yet

It's just a promise, a whisper

So I guess here I am, not the person I was

But not quite the person I'm going to be

And in this space, I'm learning that healing isn't linear

It's messy, it's painful, it's frustrating

But it's also necessary

It's the path to something better

This, this is the process

It's not pretty, but it's real

It's the scab, the peroxide, the cocoon, the bud

It's the struggle in the cocoon, the patience in the bud

And eventually it's the butterfly, the bloom

I'm in the midst of my own healing journey

It's taking time, and that's okay

Scabs will heal

I might be impatient

But this time I'm not going to rip them off

I'm going to let them fall off when they're ready

And scars, they'll come

They'll tell my story, our story

They'll be the proof of battles fought and won

Of wounds turned into wisdom

Scars are beautiful in their own way

They show that we've lived, we've loved, we've hurt

And most importantly, we've healed

And so we say, today's wounds are tomorrow's scars