epiphany slip

For a minute 
no
a second or two, tops 
I gave in. Didn't 
even know 
I was fighting it 

I don't think I was,
but 
I felt
the strange edge 
of a feeling like

what if I cared?

About what people 
think? About me? 
People I don't even 
know? 

I didn't so much 
imagine that mattering
as let the edge bleed in. 
And it felt so bad. 

like pain.
It was not 
like the pain
I knew, 
so 
the sheer
unfamiliarity 
made it almost worse! 

Hey! In that moment, 

I teetered on the brink 
of falling further maybe 
all the way in. And then stopped. 

And it all fell away. Mind-blown.  
What a weird bad rush.

Surely I have felt that way
before, 
as a child, maybe 
not. 
But I
feel some epiphany, 
now I know. And I think 
that I do.  
Compassion ordering.
I need to level up