You only hurt yourself when you gossip, 

Run a smear campaign,

Use sarcasm to demean someone.

You think you’re cutting them down

(To your size),

But doesn’t that imply

That you think he or she

Is bigger than you?

You show your envy,

Your stingy belief

That the universe isn’t grand enough 

For everyone to succeed,

(But it is).

You display your small-mindedness 

And your short sight,

Not acknowledging that

There might be at least two sides to every story,

Or even ten, or twenty sides,

Or more, 

But you won’t acknowledge the wholeness 

Of the cosmos and the possibility 

That you are just as much a part of the sin 

As you are the rightness,

And your own, overgrown self-righteousness.

So your little digs and jabs?

I have news.

They might hurt a few feelings here and there,

But most of all, 

They’re hurting you.

You’re hurting yourself,

Over and over again.

And to those of us who think we must 

Put up with this repeatedly:

Take away anyone’s right to hurt you,

And see who stays.

-jenn