Thanksgiving (The Truth No One Wants to Hear)

 

For those who gave everything and watched the feast continue...

It’s cold tonight.
Not the kind of cold that bites your skin—
the kind that seeps into your bones
and stays there,
like regret.

They called today Thanksgiving.
Someone even shipped in frozen turkey,
mushy stuffing, and little paper flags for the tables.
We ate from trays under tin lights,
pretending it tasted like home.
But home is a sound, not a place—
and that sound has been gone a long time.

I watch the others laugh.
They still believe
this is for something.
I used to believe that too.
I was 19, skinny and full of slogans.
I thought freedom was a flag, and justice a rifle.
Turns out, freedom’s a bill
someone else pays,
and justice is just
a word whispered in the dark.

We buried two boys yesterday.
One was 20.
One had a baby girl back home.
We didn’t have coffins— just body bags, zipped and tagged.
We carried them through the sand
like pilgrims dragging their dead to winter ground.
Somebody whispered a prayer.
Somebody else just stared.
The sky didn’t flinch.

This is the true Thanksgiving.
Not tables, not turkey, not candles, not parades.
It’s a meal you choke down
with blood still on your hands.
It’s carving up your own soul
so others can carve a turkey in peace.
It’s watching a country
forget what you paid, and still, still, hoping it stays worth it.

If you’re reading this,
I didn’t make it.
My hands are shaking now.
The pen keeps slipping.
But I need you to know—
this isn’t bitterness.
This is honesty.
This is the smell of iron,
the taste of blood,
the sound of a boy
calling for his mother
as he dies in a land
that will never utter his name.

When you sit down to eat, don’t thank me.
Don’t thank anyone like me.
Take a bite, and remember what it costs.
Ask yourself if you’re still worthy
of the feast, or if you’ve traded it all
for apathy and Black Friday sales.

I gave everything for this place.
Even now, bleeding into the dirt,
I’d do it again.
Because someone has to.
Because that’s what we do—
we burn so you can glow.

Happy Thanksgiving.
Eat well.
Live well.
And for God’s sake, remember who has allowed you to have this feast today.