Reconditioning

To grin

and bear the burden of perception's making,

is to put our lives at stake.

It's not the "virtuous" gesture of braving pain

for life's sake

that makes sense of any breakdown

or loss of faith.

It's the power, in which, we choose to stand.

It's the choice we make in the quiet of morning

when all is still--

potential.

The choice is to be 
what we've only dared to see ourselves as,

in spite of past conditioning.

Fight or flight--

no such thing.

Self-preservation,

a contradiction in terms.

The Self need not be preserved.

The choice is to be It--

or not.

-Jayme