We don't cry because we are weak! It is our healing power speaking. As a survivor of abuse I carried the burden alone for 60 years. When I did speak out I changed; my world changed. So did my words. The djinn of denial could not be put back in the bottle.

Abuse is the iceberg tip of neglect in the sea of institutional oversight. It is just the tip of significant failure of someone to do their duty. They are the true perpetrators. We all have a role to play in creating change if we are not just going to bark up the dark side of history.

I don't seek medals for words dipped in gold and blood, nor am I looking for a hill to die on. As a survivor I am, unfortunately, not alone. Yet abuse is invisible to outsiders. We can only reveal it by illustrating the spaces around it. Shame cannot live in the light. We must put a human face to it.

This ore took a lifetime to mine. Through blood and dust and swelter I wrought these words, not with my hand but with my heart.

N.W.