Brent Boeckman

Standing in the rubble of a life split wide open.
Not a door ajar, but the whole damn house blown in.
The discovery of a person who poured every drop
of cement into the crack—
watching the foundation still just… snap.

The raw mix: Exhaustion. Confusion.
The voice thick with the simple, brutal intrusion of failure,
even when doing everything right, yet feeling so “dead inside.”
Living from duty. Not desire.
A steady, grey tide, prioritizing everyone else, always, over the self.
Where one’s own soul quietly knelt.

Grief as the undertone, the audible thrum, but beneath it,
a faint hum—a low, ready chord.
A willingness to look inward.
To finally stop running from the pain that had been coming,
and coming.
“The fog,” the brutal, constant split.
One moment: Powerful. Grounded. A fortress wall.
The next: Miserable. Disoriented. Ready to fall.
The brutal swing between the collapse and the strength.
The fight fought a whole life’s length.

But beneath the ground, the old reflex seated—
a script, etched deep, where the choice is always flat:

“My whole existence has been everybody else’s priority over me.”

Stating it. Then, stopping.
The world pausing.
The pendulum dropping.
Something landing.
The recognition. The invisible script. The old, worn-out condition.
A crack opening—not the violent kind this time.

A quiet door to a peace that isn’t a crime.

Brent Boeckman is a men’s somatic trauma and emotional resiliency coach and has been writing poetry as a means of expression, healing, and connection for as long as he can remember. He leads with his heart, is a proud father, and is a community advocate for mental health.

This poem appeared in What We Hold On To: Poems of Coping, Connection, and Carrying On — Winter 2026, published by The Chaos Section Poetry Project.  You can read the full collection or download a free PDF of the chapbook here.