kitty karma
cats are funny.
cause they know what we're saying,
(words in one ear, out the other)
they just pretend that they don't.
selective hearing at its finest,
as they look everywhere *except* at you!
and the second you add in the magic word,
"fine, I'll give you a treat after..."
they'll saunter on over
look you dead in the eyes
like an innocent angel
stick their neck above the green collar with it's bell, just waiting
to be snapped back on...
and then, when you're done,
they will give you a side eye,
grab the treat with their teeth,
and walk away to go
eat it somewhere else.
say what you will,
but that's a whole other level
of petty
one that I wish
I aspired to.
warning signs
1.
why did nobody warn me
before I watched 'sleeping with other people'
that all that I would see
in an emotional relationship
that never became more;
in the best friendship,
with two parts of one soul,
in a lobster,
in his one that got away, in his "that's for my girl", in a love so deep they dared not cross that line,
that the only people I would see in all of that
was me
and
you?
2.
and why did no one warn me
before I watched 'dear john'
thinking it was a bad romance adaptation,
that while there is love in it, fine,
it's actually a movie
about accepting differences
and autism
and illness
and fathers and their children?
and why did no one warn me,
the autistic child of
the undiagnosed autistic father
who was so badly hurt by the world
that he turned on his own children,
abused and mistreated them,
that I
would not
could not
ever
be
prepared?
lies
I suppose that there are many different types.
there is the lie I tell when I say I am 24, when I mean that this is my twenty-fourth year on this planet and soon I will be entering another.
there are lies we tell children, those 'harmless' ones. cultural tales and legends and tricks to get them to behave a certain way.
there is the lie of one who has fallen out of love - repeating words with lost meaning, no effort, and in avoidance of honesty with themselves.
there's the lie of the deceiver, an intentional misleading. who they are, what they want from you, who they are willing to take down to get it.
and then there is a different kind of lie - the kind that comes from fear. and while sometimes it's well intentioned, it's the one that stings the most. it takes many, many forms.
somehow they always pick the lie that crosses every category. they tell me the same words in different ways. and usually, they mean to comfort, but they don't know quite how, and they don't have the answers. fear does many things.
so yes. there are many different lies. but there are only a few that pierce straight to my soul. so don't tell me that I will be okay just because you do not have the answers. i have sought out my future in the vitality of those who have lived through what I have. and it helped with the trauma. it helped me through the abuse. it helps me survive nights of PTSD flashbacks and harm to myself where I struggle to remember why I am still here, where I fight voices in my head that repeat the words drilled into my being since birth, that prevented my worth from ever growing, that destroyed any semblance of self that ever began to sprout green life from concrete and gravel with hatred and hunger and glee.
but there is no vitality of those with my letters, my labels, my illnesses, far up ahead, in my current progression. my clinical profile identical to those in their 30s and 40s - what's that mean for me? No one can say. It's anyone's guess, anyone's game. I'm not sure it's a game that I'd quite like to play. So no, do not lie to me. Don't tell me that I'm going to be okay; grant me that one kindness. They number only few, those from whom these words and this comfort accepted.
decade dedication
whenever someone asks me for my age
it takes me a moment to respond
because sometimes I forget which answer is correct
aren't i still six?
my memories are narrative
i don't know if it's the norm
they're stories held by someone else
passed along the chain within my brain
and yet I know that I was there
I remember it in sequence
just not staring out my own eyes
more like watching from the eaves
knowing logically and feeling memories
are not, evidently, the same thing
sometimes i forget how old i am
because i have felt too much
for only twenty-four years to hold
- see, there I go again!
because I am still twenty-three.
but even so I forget.
I have told it wrong for months.
truly, by accident.
how can twenty-three years
contain all that I have lived
it cannot hold in the pain
nor the memories
no matter how I know them
no matter how I hold them
my brain says 'twenty-four'
as though the extra months
will stretch it all out
lighten up the load
as if maybe knowing this May
could mark the start of twenty-five
might help me survive
under the crushing weight
of a life that should be stretched
much, much, further,
'cross many more years
but, no. reality is it's just my
twenty-three to bear the burden
though they seem too weak
to many, even often so to me
would it thin out more
if I felt as though I were twenty-nine?
I know not. but I am not, and so
I should not speculate.
and really, this is my 24th year on this planet
my birthday only marks the conclusion of it.
but sometimes when
they ask how old I am and
I have to stop and think
I hesitate because I wonder
why they want to know.
is it so that they can judge my years,
casually decide upon the value
of my experiences, my words?
it feels that way, sometimes
even when they do not mean for it to.
i am twenty-three, I want to scream,
i am twenty-three, but my twenty-three
matches your thirty-five.
and my twenty-three matches *your* forty-nine.
and if this is all
stuffed into my twenty-three
and so many others
with so much less
and so many more years
did not make it,
or they sit here just like I do now,
then how am I to know
that i could one day be okay?
it is easy to forget what it is like
to be nineteen, to be twenty, twenty-one
or to be age twenty-two.
i wish i could remind you
but those years for me
have not been what
everyone else's seem to be
so i sit quietly and listen
to your forty-two
and your sixty-seven
your thirty-six
and your fifty-four
and you are all in pain
and your pain is real
and you are valid and seen
but i cannot help but wonder.
and when I step out for a moment
to refill my water bottle
please know that this is code
for crying in a bathroom stall
because i am scared. and i am young. and no one can tell me
what the future will be
so don't you dare say
that i will be ok.
you don't know that.
we are in the same place,
only i got here far too soon
for anyone to say what is next.
let me cry. let me scream. let me be.
I know I am kind,
I make people laugh
they call me gracious and patient
the delightful perfect patient
who takes it all in step
and has it all in hand
but i confess it all pretend;
and i do not know how
no one else has noticed yet.
of course i'm not okay.
I know I should be brave.
but I think people forget
that i am twenty-three.
2:54
seconds tick by slowly
each micro click of metered level shifting to accommodate the intake of a breath
of the dust, melancholy in the moment
lungs inflating with the staleness of silence
filling up with dread, anxiety, a dash of pain, a pinch of panic,
and all the things that take over
the air at late-night thoughts
and time moving so slow
that I think it must be frozen
but no,
because there it is. the number switch, slow as ever,
2:55 am.
now we do it all again.
(repeat until sleep, morning, or death.)
call me out, but don’t expect that I will answer
I am accustomed to my own nonsense.
Desensitized to the trauma of the clinics, the doctors, the tests and medications, emergency departments, ambulances, IV's and treatments - sure, all of that. But mostly, to my jokes. I cope with humor. This isn't news to anyone. But what is new to me is how you respond. It puzzles me.
I don't know what to do with your words. I shy away. I flinch from them. You don't laugh when I joke about the things that are not funny, you ignore the joke and tell me how much you admire me. You're proud of me. You can't imagine going through this stuff is easy, and it seems like I always have a great attitude about it. Who told you you could see through me like that? Who said you were allowed?
Fuck off with that. Fuck off. I want to be mad. Let me be mad, please. I have to. Let me ignore it. Let me make 'grr' faces when you compliment my survival skills. (I shouldn't have to have them). Let me reject your compliments in favor of the jokes. Because I cannot accept them when doing so will only make me break. I am not allowed to do that. It's the one think I won't allow myself to do.
I can't afford to break, stranger. Or... whatever you are. Not a stranger. Not just a friend, but not quite more yet, either. In-between, for now. I cannot afford to break for you. So if you want to call me out, you can feel so free. But please, please understand that I can't answer. I'm not ready. I'm too scared and I have far too much to lose.
riposte
i would love to say that it has never been in my nature to fire back with angry retort, to stand up for myself
or put up a fight.
but really the truth is
it's not about nature at all,
and much more a product of the fact that
when you are a child
and your bully is not
you learn very quickly not to make things worse by trying
out bravery, but rather
to help it end quickly, as quickly as possible
by staying silent and suffering through.
because grown-ups get bored
and move right along
when they realize that it's not as much fun
to pick on a child who has no intentions
of giving a reason, or of fighting back.
a ramble on mourning the living, being haunted by the past, and numbing the pain with words
tonight my whispers carry 'cross the night air because here I am, again, sitting in the grass, staring at the same sky as you, remembering the midnight conversations by a volleyball court and the ones on the pavement and the ones on brick, and the ones accompanied by the cheap tang of Burnett's and the crisp bubbles of Bold Rock (and both, when we were bold); and the whispers of those conversations can swirl around me all they want, they can try to take over my thoughts and my head and my heart but I have learned how to keep them at bay. I look at the stars and I go about my day and I send my "I miss you"s as they pop up, on their way into the wind, hoping they'll just fade.
But I know they won't. I know, because sometimes, I get them, too. Sometimes I get an 'I miss you' when you must be browsing books; when you must be in the woods, telling trees by their leaves; when you drive past a school, when you play guitar and feel my fingers guiding yours, teaching you each chord, hear my voice tuning each string, humming the songs I sing along to daily. Just as I send you mine, when 8 see birds pass by and know them by color and song, and I see beautiful wood craftsmanship that someone's worked on; or when I fight with my computer, type in simple lines of code, call IT, do a lath problem, read tech industry news from my phone. Each one of these instances sends a message your direction. It's out of my control. I only hope that you don't mind the misdirection from your primary aims.
it's late and I am fighting sleep. My eyes are barely open, keep on closing, and I don't know that I make sense. But please forgive me, friend. I miss the thing we had. I know we can't go back. I miss the love we shared that was so unique to us. I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I will wait a thousand years if that is how long it will take for you to remember that you once told me I was the only person you could and you would ever be able to be safe with.
Thank you for being safe for me. You have no idea. You are one of the few people who knows even part of it, and you have no idea. I will never tell you all of it because despite the fact that I know you and iz Know you're not a violent person, I don't know what you would do to him if you knew. (You know who I mean.)
Fuck. I'm writing to a ghost. You'll never read this. Things will never be the same again. I may have my best friend back but I don't have my soul partner, my missing link. It's difficult explain that. But it's a feeling, it's just.. incorrect. Fuck.
let go. let me go. fucking hell. I can handle this.
*I miss you.*
[overdue] conversations
"Why didn't you ever leave? You said you thought about it."
"I almost left before the other babies were born. And maybe I should have. I set some money aside, I had my eye on a house far enough away, a little brick place on the corner of a road. The counselor convinced me to try & make it work, my friends too. And then again, after New York."
"I don't get it. Like... I just- I know you didn't know better, but how does someone... not see the signs?
"I don't really know. He only ever hurt me. It was only ever me. I was convinced he didn't touch the kids, that he wouldn't ever lay a hand on you guys."
"Mom, that's not... " and for the first time, my voice cracks. I can't remember the last time I showed emotion in front of my mother. It's very, very rare. "That's not- how it works." I finally manage to push through the scratch in my throat.
Her own grief mirrors mine, but hers is also draped in something I have *never* seen my mother, the woman who lives loudly and boldy with her heart on her sleeve, wear: shame. "I know that now. I just didn't at the time.
"...He was always so... protective. Half the time, the violence, the crazy reactions, were about something he deemed 'unacceptable' with you."
*Protective. Protective. Protective.*
We both know it's the wrong word. I close my eyes and inhale, a big, long, breath before blowing it out, exhaling the headache, and, I hope, blowing away my anger. Probably not, though.
Because the word, of course, isn't "Protective." It's "Possessive." If there's one thing in the world that that man is a winner at, it's owning things. sure hope it's made him so incredibly happy.
I don't say it. I don't say any of it, don't even bother correcting her beyond saying, "I guess people don't know about this stuff if they've never been exposed to it before. It's not your fault, it never was, Mom. I used to be really angry, you know. I used to wish you had left, even if it meant I didn't have as many siblings." She nods, understanding. Silent. Rarity.
"But it's just so wild to me that we will make so many excuses for people we love even when they hurt us."
I don't continue what I'm thinking, which is this: 'And where's the line? When does it go from hurting us, to hurting others in the name of protection? Excuses, excuses, excuses.' And all of a sudden we're looking back and we have become the enablers of abuse. And not only do we feel responsible, but now we feel guilty too. Like my mom does right now. Like she does about my sister. And bringing her up right now. Because all of a sudden, we see the cycle repeating itself, and it's far too late for any one of us to do anything about it except watch from a distance. Because I refuse to stand there and take yet more abuse from someone who doesn't even pretend to love me. And I refuse to watch yet another person hurt her while my mother stands there and just takes it. I will not, and cannot, be witness to it again.
medicine.
swallow down your pills to start the day. count them with me, now - don't forget that this is what is keeping you Alive.
one. (grief.)
two. (pain.)
three. (poison.)
four. (suffering.)
five. (fear.)
(there is grief, and pain, in the poison of suffering from that which we call life... but everyone lives, and everyone experiences fear.)
still with me? very good. next set, hon. when you get all done I'll take those vitals for ya & then let you go right back to sleep.
six. (strength.)
seven. (courage.)
eight. (ambition.)
nine. (pride.)
ten. (tears.)
(Strength fails sometimes, but it takes courage to pick yourself back up again and work towards higher aims. Only then can you look back at how far you've come with pride and tears in your eyes.)
you're doing great. almost done. it's not fair, but life isn't fair, and we don't get to choose.
eleven. (dread.)
twelve. (isolation.)
thirteen. (panic.) -
(the dread i feel at an implied isolation, a loss of independence, leaves me in a panic. this will not be my future. the pills halt halfway down my chest.)
you gotta keep going, baby. almost there, you're almost there. four more, hear me? only four left.
*four left. four left. four left. stack them up. stack them high, like bricks, let them climb the ladder of my esophagus inside my chest to escape the cavity of my body's prison, let them be free of me*
fourteen. (lonely.) fifteen. (alone) sixteen. (..alone.) seventeen.. (...)
Oh, shit, did she just- *She's not breathing, call Blue-* Trying Heimlich now, get a Doctor in here- *I need a Trach, NOW!*-
*Code Blue in E2. Code Blue in E2. Code Blue in E2.*
~~
time to wake up, hon. good morning! brought you your
medicine.
swallow down your pills to start the day. count them with me, now - don't forget that this is what is keeping you Alive.