I Cry, Really

Why do they restrain me from crying?
They say men don’t cry
and it doesn’t matter if you’re young or old, got it?

They tell me that those who cry are not strong
even when facing the magnitude of death

But me… HAAAH, I’m a lucky guy
I cry REALLY and I stand firm,
not that you care.

I learned early that tears were a flaw,
a defect displayed in the window of virility.
Swallow it dry, they said.
But swallowing the world
always gave me indigestion of humanity.

They call weakness what is overflow.
As if feeling were a technical error
in the engineering of the ideal male.
As if the soul had to run in silence,
no logs, no traces, no signal.

To cry is to admit that something matters.
And I care too much.
About the loss, about the absence,
about the weight of days
and about what was left behind.

If tears were cowardice,
grief would be spectacle.
But it is not.
It is inner combat,
an earthquake without an audience.

I cry because I feel.
I feel because I live.
And living is not posing as unbreakable,
it is allowing the chest to burn
without needing to turn to marble.

So let them talk.
Let them call me whatever they want.
I remain here, whole in my cracks.
I cry, really.
And I remain strong; precisely because of it.