Don’t ask me to line up my children and then pick out one,
The smallest, feeblest little darling, the fragile stunted runt
My hands fumbling, sweating, – your gun shaking in my clammy grip
You’re shouting at me to shoot at her, but her little tears are drip-ping-

KILL YOUR DARLINGS – IT’S FOR YOUR GREATER GOOD

But all I want is to hold her close, to protect her from the world.
She’s frightened, her breath shaking – but she knows I never could – shoot
Rough around the edges, her form is lacking and her words are simple
You would have me execute an innocent, a heart that was born crippled?

KILL YOUR DARLINGS- IT’S HOLDING YOU BACK

If death is inevitable then please, just let her die out somewhere else along the track– in 5, 20, 50 years
Just don’t make me end it, that life was a gift, it belongs to her.
And if success means bloodied hands from butchering my ugly babies in the night,
I’d rather be poor, alone and a failure, holding my perfect imperfections tightly-
Such cruelty just isn’t in me
I’m sorry I can’t kill my darlings,
I would miss them too much.

AN – Someone told me yesterday that to improve as a writer you often have to ‘kill your darlings’.