The Price of Kindness

The Cost of Mockery 

We did not begin here

no one does

We were walking once—

just listening
to voices not our own

testing the edges
of what we believed

then we stood—
long enough
to feel less like strangers
more like we belonged

truth softened there
not shattered
just… reshaped
to fit the company

and somewhere between
agreement
and silence

We found a seat

יָשַׁב

We remained 

not for the moment 

but long enough 

to dwell 

מוֹשָׁב

it became a place— 

familiar 

comfortable 

ours 

לוּץ 

and there 

in that dwelling— 

We learned the language 

the curl of the lip 

the easy dismissal 

the hollow laugh 

at things that once held weight

We did not notice
when reverence left—

only that it stopped knocking

mockery asks so little
at first

just a smile
at someone else’s cost

just a word
sharpened for effect

just a moment
of distance
from what is difficult
to carry

but it does not stay small

it builds a house
and invites us to live there

until kindness feels heavy
and truth feels optional

and everything sacred
becomes a punchline

We did not begin here

but we remained

and the cost
was not paid in words

but in what we lost—
the ability
to hold
without breaking 

into laughter

and now—

 

to be kind 

feels heavier 

than mockery ever did

© Ron Simpson Jr. 

Psalms 1.1