those without childhoods

he without clothes,

wearing striped red socks

and trying to bend and twist his limbs back into place

because that's all he knows

('something's wrong with him')

and that's all he's ever been taught to see.

she who is a dreamer,

who sits agains her cell and still

wonders what colour kindness would be,

who still cries when it's dark

because she remembers when she was young

and crying would get her sympathy and food

and, if anything at all, a confirmation

that she still existed,

that people could even see her at all.

he and she and all those other children,

who are nothing more than dead bodies,

than corpses,

with only eyes moving, ticking,

back then forth and dead then dying.

they are just broken things

trying to make themselves whole,

wooden limbs snapped at birth

with instincts that scream run

when somebody tries to touch them

and-

do you think they've ever been hugged before,

been told 'i love you'?

do you think they've ever felt this

'kindness' that they dream about?

do you think they know that the sky is 

blue and grey and yellow somedays,

or that sometimes,

just sometimes,

when a hand reaches out to them-

it's not to hit them

but instead to comfort them?