Patience and experience,

Can you have one without the other?

Or, before you have the former, must you have a proper grasp of the latter?

Like receiving a savage beating to the head and torso:

Bearing through the pain;

While being beaten to within a whisker of meeting your maker;

And, even faced with wave upon wave of unbearable pain:

Managing to break out into a blood-smeared, broken-toothed, savage grin,

It does not make it any less painful y’see,

But it does give you perspective to abide and hope by,

To put away the hollow helplessness of before,

And mock your attacker with defiance,

To do their worst!

For, this is not the first beating you have endured,

And, though the experience left you near crippled,

You – even, now, in this present extremity – recall:

It hurt far more the first time round!

Perhaps it’s the onset of delirium and madness mixed with concussion,

But, if it provides you even the slightest hint of hesitation in your attacker,

A narrow opening:

To launch yourself  at him to rip out his bastard neck, and taste his life force ebb and flow away from him,

As he had taken great pleasure in leisurely shattering yours moments earlier;

Tables turn on occasion,

And, it is experience that allows you to judge when to time your counter-strike ;

Whereas, without patience, you would  never have reached that opportune moment at all.