The thin yellow line
The thin blue line
The thin silver line
All blue bloods through and through
A family of blood sweat and tears
And on those rare occasions joy
Not by birth
Not by vocation
But by calling
By the blood we bleed
When we lose one of our own
You’re not born with blue blood
But you swear an oath
Uphold the constitution
Protect and serve
You earn that blood through the scars
Physical and mental
Seen and unseen
By the missed holidays
By the missed birthdays
By the shared trauma
Not born to it
But by God they’re family
You hear of a death across the country and your heat drops
No God not another you cry
Eventually the heartache becomes easier
Cause you’ve earned you blue blood
You’ve earned your scars seen and unseen
God there’s so many
Especially the unseen
No longer distinguishable from one another
Hard to tell which cane first
Where one starts and another ends
Everyday you put on the mask
I am strong
I’m unbreakable
Especially when you know you’re not
Especially when you’re falling apart
Because that’s what they need
And what’s expected
None escape unscathed
We all beat the marks
A lot of us now bear the diagnoses
PTSD
CPTSD
Depression
Anxiety
Major depressive disorder
Still you wouldn’t go back and change it if you could
Protect and serve
Doesn’t just mean physically
It’s it’s also psychologically
5, 10, 20, 30 years or more
Every day a battle
Holding the line
A career of war to serve and protect
From the monsters that hide in society
Sometimes in plain sight
“I have seen Evil True Evil and it wears the skin of Men”
Against our own Demons
We gained in our service
Or the demons that we had and were fed by it
Against the ever alluring promises of
Ineffective coping
Especially alcohol
Cheap easily procured and socially acceptable to a point
We know we’re appreciated and loved by many
But you don’t hear it or see it enough
This isn’t a plea or a demand
Just a glimpse of the scars
Of the people who we couldn’t save
The children and adults we’ve watched die
Sometimes in our arms
Of the screams, wails, and last words
That haunt the soul of dispatchers
When we arrive to late
The ones we lost to suicide
The ones we gave compressions and cpr to
Our brothers and sisters who lost their ward with their demons
Of the shots we didn’t want to take
Of the things we wish we could have stopped
The crying abused children
The battered spouses
Who welcome their abused back with a smile
Or with fear and trembling
Afraid of what will happen if they don’t
It all changes you
It builds you up and tears you down
It is what is and it’s what we live
Till we can’t take it anymore or we persevere and retire
Dedicated with love to all my Brothers and Sisters. Dedicated to all Dispatchers, Police Officers, First Responders, and Correctional Officers all of which include County, City, State and Federal.